As public schools continue to produce abysmal scores, particularly for minority students, board and union officials have called for lowering or suspending proficiency standards or declared meritocracy to be a form of “white supremacy.” Gifted and talented programs are being eliminated in the name of “equity.”

Once parents have a choice, these teachers lose a virtual monopoly over many families, and these districts could lose billions in states like Florida.

Chicago is literally telling families of highly competitive students to leave public education or reduce their expectations. For those who can afford it, they must now look to private or religious schools. Most cannot afford such choice and the state has long been hostile vouchers. Indeed, the state (which has long been dominated by the far-left teachers union) recently became the first state to rollback on vouchers as other states are expanding such programs.

[‘Equity’ is in all applied cases an effort to force everything and everyone to a median. That’s true whether it gets applied to education, wealth distribution, whatever — ‘equity’ measures eliminate actual performance and rewards designed to incentivize it. That causes the ‘median’ to drift and then run sharply downward over time, as every socialist/communist society has demonstrated …. and as our educational systems are presently demonstrating at all levels. — Ed]