More tax dollars at work:
A Florida State University center has used more than a half-million in education tax dollars to put a positive spin on President Bush’s key school policies, including hiring a public relations firm to teach charter schools to be more media-savvy.
Despite conflicting studies on the success of charter schools and other alternative education programs, the School Choice Center at FSU touts them as ways to “increase student achievement, increase parental involvement, promote school improvement through constructive competition, and accomplish racial and ethnic diversity.”
. . .
Since 2003, taxpayers have given the center $627,567 as part of a 5-year, $1.2 million federal grant made available through the No Child Left Behind Act, which promotes school choice as a fix for failing public schools.
The center’s mission is to make parents aware of all choice programs, including traditional magnet schools, expand the number of choice schools in the state, and help them “work the media” � as was written in one of the PR firm’s pamphlets.
But links on the center’s Web site are almost entirely to studies and articles from conservative groups and strong school-choice proponents such as the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Center for Education Reform and the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research.
These days I think that’s called “fair and balanced” reporting.