One of the hardest things to do on the education beat is to cover private school choice in a way that isn’t narrow-minded, superficial, or simplistic.
At Education Week, that difficult job has fallen to assistant managing editor Matthew Stone, who oversees policy and politics and school finance coverage — including private school choice.
In this new interview, Stone describes how fast-moving the school choice space has been — now at roughly 1.5 million students and 18 states with universal programs.
“That landscape has just ballooned over the past four or five years, especially in the past three,” says Stone. “Just keeping up with the sheer number of developments has been a challenge.”
Watch or read the transcript above or on YouTube. Listen to it on Spotify or Apple.
Every state’s program is a little bit different. The outcomes and effects of the efforts aren’t yet entirely clear. “One challenge is not knowing a lot of answers at this point.”
Three years ago, school choice was mostly a state thing. Now Stone and his colleagues are tracking whether or not states will participate in the federal program coming online next year.
Here are some recent EdWeek stories about school choice by Stone, Mark Lieberman, and Brooke Schultz (who now works at the Philadelphia Inquirer):
They Said No to the Federal School Choice Program. Now, 3 Dems Are Reconsidering
Which States Have Private School Choice?
Federal Program Will Bring Private School Choice to At Least 4 New States
Private School Choice Is Growing. What Comes Next?
The Legal Fight Over Private School Choice: Who Is Suing and Why?
Previously from The Grade
Full-time reporting on school choice (with Josh Snyder / Arkansas Democrat Gazette)
Surprises a reporter experiences inside a newly-opened private school in Alabama
Inside the Harper’s magazine story about teaching at an ESA-funded micro-school
