Parents deserve Clinton's choice - Bill and Hillary Clinton's decision to send their daughter Chelsea to private school - Column

Insight on the News, Feb 8, 1993 by Suzanne Fields

Two cheers, with one hand clapping, for the parents of Chelsea Clinton. They did the right thing in putting their daughter ahead of their politics, choosing the school they think is best for her.

So what if it's a private school? So what if it costs more than $10,000 a year? They've got the money and they carefully thought about their daughter's needs, based on what they called "our changing circumstances."

But they won't get a third cheer, or genuine applause, unless they use this opportunity to rethink their arguments against school choice.

"Where you stand depends on where you're sitting," a wise man once told me. Now sitting in the White House, Bill Clinton can take a fresh look at education and see why school choice, including vouchers for private as well as public schools, is needed for lots of families who experience "changing circumstances." And for those whose "circumstances" remain the same, too.

Hillary and Bill might want to talk to my friends Maria and Luis. They emigrated from Bolivia a decade ago. They met and married and became U.S. citizens. Maria is a beautician; Luis is a waiter. They have two children, a daughter, age 5, and a son, age 7, both of whom earned scholarships to a prestigious private school. But their scholarships don't cover the full tuition.

Maria and Luis pay $2,000 every year as their share of the tuition of $8,000 per child. They can't deduct this money from their taxes, although it takes a huge bite out of their income. The private school is definitely superior to any of the public schools, so they say they have "no choice" but to pay.

Hillary and Bill also might like to talk to two other friends of mine, Dan and Alice, who live in a small town in Virginia. He's a carpenter; she's a full-time mother who also looks after her own mother. Their daughter, age 11, attends a small private school that costs $2,000 a year. That money would otherwise go toward the parents' retirement or their daughter's college education. It's worth it to pay the extra money now because their local public school is "too rough." Like the Clintons, they had many family discussions about what's best for their daughter.

They learned that Virginia spends $4,437 per pupil in the public school. The average private school in Virginia spends only $2,645 per pupil, according to a report published in 1991 by Virginia Citizens for a Sound Economy, a grass roots group that encourages fiscal responsibility. So which system do you suppose has the higher average SAT scores? Private, 951; public, 900.

Dan and Alice voted for George Bush because they liked his support for vouchers or tax credits for private schools as well as public schools. Maria and Luis voted for Bill Clinton, but they thought he supports school choice for private as well as public schools.

These parents would like a program like one initiated in Milwaukee, which offers a few hundred boys and girls the opportunity to use half the amount Wisconsin spends per pupil -- $2,500 -- at nonsectarian, private schools.

That's real choice.

Big chunks of public school money sustain an ever-enlarging bureaucracy and teacher salaries that are unrelated to merit. Most private school teachers earn considerably less than most public school teachers, but they spend more time preparing lessons and have fewer absences. Private schools must please the parent who forks over a fee. Public schools often get more money if they do poorly.

When George Stephanopoulos, Clinton's spokesman, defended Bill and Hillary's decision to send Chelsea to private school, he said: "You can't put politics into a personal family decision."

That's right. But you can put a personal family decision into politics. You could ask Bill and Hillary Clinton.