A report card grading states on parental rights slapped California with a D-.
The Center for Education Reform (CER) ranked the Golden State in 37th place on the Parent Power Index (PPI) partly because it has no school choice programs and because school districts have sole power to authorize and make decisions about the existence and operations of charter schools.
“When you entrust teachers with your child for eight hours, we act as that parental agent and when that first came about, it wasn't a bad thought," said Ted Lamb, founder of Conservative Teachers of America (CTA), a national support network for some 8,300 conservative teachers nationwide. "But unfortunately, public education in California has taken that idea to a whole new level of 'We, the institution, know far more, and we are the ones that should be in control of your children.'"
Lamb
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The PPI measures each state’s ability to afford parents the power to make decisions for their child’s education, to provide transparency, to value the condition of each child’s family, and to put children first before the education system.
Florida was the top-ranking state on the Index followed by Arizona, Indiana, Ohio, and Wisconsin.
California scored highly in the area of teacher compensation at 88%, but below the 50% mark in student proficiency for math and reading.
“The union and teacher preparatory programs have a hold on education in California,” Lamb said. “Everyone talks about unions in many ways, but we don't talk much about the local university down the road that's preparing teachers. Where do you think teachers get the philosophies that they get? It’s right in the curriculum.”
When it comes to digital and personalized learning, California received a D grade despite the creation of the Closing the Digital Divide Task Force in 2020.
That’s because there are no statewide commitments or requirements for personalized learning and California needs about 708,400 laptops and 322,100 Wi-Fi hotspots to link every student to the web, according to the Index.
But Lamb thinks students may be better off because he views too much technology as a detriment.
“Forget about a technology gap," he said. "What about the academic skills gap? How are we doing with that? How are we doing with actually producing well-rounded students who can actually think, write and reason logically? I would make the argument that technology, because of its expansive use, has actually created an academic skills divide."