Some missed gist of school choice report

Patrick Wolf & John Witte:

We released a set of five baseline reports on the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program last month, the first new studies of the voucher program using individual student data since 1995. Since then, many stories and commentaries have been published. Some of those contained inaccurate, incomplete or misleading information.

First, our research project is supported by a large consortium of philanthropies with diverse positions regarding school choice but a uniform commitment to non-interference in the research. We would not conduct this research under any other conditions. Our funders include the Annie E. Casey, Joyce, Kern, Lynde and Harry Bradley, Robertson and Walton Family foundations.

We listed this complete set of funding organizations at the start of each of our five reports. Unfortunately, Alan J. Borsuk's Feb. 26 Journal Sentinel story about the studies ("Voucher study finds parity,") reported the names of only three of the six philanthropies. The omission created a false impression - subsequently repeated by Mary Bell ("Voucher school achievements are still not measurable," March 8) - that the evaluation is primarily backed by "pro-voucher" foundations.

That is simply not true.

Second, no reliable conclusions about the effectiveness of the choice program can or should be drawn from these initial descriptive data. We provided that important guidance throughout our reports. Nevertheless, many commentators chose to ignore it.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at March 18, 2008 2:44 PM
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