Walter E. Williams Quotes

The problems of public schools will not be solved by cutting off the source of their funding, which is what vouchers are.

To me, it looks like an opportunity for school choice. I'd also like to see a pilot program to allow true school choice ? vouchers.

I believe there ought to be school choice, so that parents can choose within the public school system.

We're not proposing any shifting of funding from public schools to private schools.

The role of the federal government, if any, is to create more school choice.

The White House, in advancing the agenda for a [school] "choice" plan, rests its faith on market mechanisms. What reason have the black and very poor to lend their credence to a market system that has proved so obdurate and so resistant to their pleas at every turn?

On the [Betsy] DeVos case, I agree that the gun - her gun position is kind of weird, kind of crazy, but I do think she does know about public schools.

The people who run the international tests told us, "the biggest predictor of student success is choice." Nations that "attach the money to the kids" and thereby allow parents to choose between different public and private schools have higher test scores. This should be no surprise; competition makes us better.

When you say you don't think we should have public schools, they can't believe you mean that. You must mean that they should be smaller. But you can't really mean no public schools.

And there should not be a limit on the creation of new public schools. We ought to expand choices for parents.

When I was mayor of New York, my views changed. I began as mayor of New York City thinking that I could reform the New York City school system. After two or three years, four years, I became an advocate of choice, of scholarships, and vouchers, and parental choice, because I thought that was the only way to really change the school system.

And before our current legislature adjourns, we intend to become the first state of full and true choice by saying to every low and middle-income Hoosier family, if you think a non-government school is the right one for your child, you're as entitled to that option as any wealthy family; here's a voucher, go sign up.

Arizona is a national leader in school choice with both charter schools and tuition tax credits giving parents and their children more school choices than ever before.

The people of Missouri said they expect their elected leaders to support public schools because they know that education is the best economic development tool there is.

The key for all cities is whether you turn the public schools around.

The folks who run the poverty industry in this town are worried that kids will get a better education at schools that cost half the amount they spend on the public schools. In their shoes, I'd be worried too.

When people lose faith in a system as they have in the public school system, they no longer want to support it.

While the public school rewards failure by throwing more government money at failing school systems, the voucher system does the opposite.

If confirmed, I will be a strong advocate for great public schools.

Charter schools are not a panacea.

The bigger goal of giving all parents more choices is one that will have to be discussed and undoubtedly roundly debated, but we are going to have to continue to build the case. The momentum is there on the state level in many states. That's where the energy needs to be harnessed in a new way.

Often times, when we talk about improving our public schools, it is easy to come back to the question of money. Are schools basically fine, just underfunded? Millennials say no - more funding isn't the cure-all for what ails our schools.

I went to public schools, which is to say publicly financed.

Millennials are not deeply familiar with school choice, and have some reservations, especially about the types of institutions that a student might choose to attend with taxpayer dollars.

Public education is so important - resisting privatization and charterization, high-stakes testing, and defunding. It's important for New York, but it's also important for the country.