SCHOOL CHOICE MEASURE TO HOUSE

Legislation in the Missouri House would provide limited school choice in the Cape Girardeau, St. Louis and Kansas City public schools.

Under House Bill 1037, the state would assist low-income families in those three school districts who want to put their children in private or parochial schools or other public schools outside their district.

State Rep. Mary Kasten, R-Cape Girardeau, is one of the co-sponsors of the legislation. She said the three-year demonstration project would give the state a chance to experiment with school choice.

But Kasten and others say such a measure faces an uphill fight.

"It is kind of a long shot," said Mike Hoey, assistant director of the Missouri Catholic Conference and architect of the bill.

Critics such as public school superintendents say the bill could be unconstitutional.

The Missouri Constitution requires all state education money to go to public schools.

"Missouri has a constitution that was written in a very anti-Catholic vein," said the Rev. Edward Eftink, pastor of Immaculate Conception Catholic Church at Jackson.

Eftink served as superintendent of Catholic schools for the Springfield-Cape Girardeau Diocese from 1977 to 1991.

He said it is unlikely state lawmakers will approve any school-choice bill without a change in the state constitution.

Hoey said, "Parents are the primary educators and they ought to have more ability to direct their child's education."

Wealthy parents can afford to send their children to private and parochial schools or even other public school districts. That option isn't open to many middle-class parents struggling to keep ahead financially, Hoey said.

And it is out of the question for low-income families. "Low-income folks have really little choice," said Hoey.

Hoey said Cape Girardeau was included in the bill to see how school choice would work in a rural school district.

"We knew there were a couple of private schools down there and there was some interest," Hoey said.

Under the bill, the state would pay the cost of tuition for eligible low-income students.

Income eligibility would be tied to the federal poverty level. A family of four with income of $25,000 or $26,000 could seek tuition aid.

The program would be limited to a maximum of 4 percent of the students living in the district the first year, 8 percent the second, and 12 percent the third year.

Hoey said the program over three years could involve 5,000 to 6,000 students in St. Louis, 4,000 to 5,000 in Kansas City, and 500 to 600 in Cape Girardeau. Those numbers include some students already attending parochial or private schools.

Students must be entering kindergarten or ninth grade to initially receive the tuition vouchers, although they could continue to receive such aid in the succeeding years of the program.

The three public school districts wouldn't lose any state aid resulting from any enrollment drop caused by the program. The state would make up the difference for the three school districts, with the money used to provide assistance to at-risk students and to combat school violence.

"Really, it is a very modest proposal," said Hoey. "We tried to design it in a way that we remove some of the fears and concerns of the public school folks."

But area school superintendents worry about even limited school choice.

"Certainly anything that gets into a voucher system from a funding point of view will weaken public school funding," said David Fuemmeler, superintendent of the Nell Holcomb elementary school district.

As it now is written, the bill would apply to other school districts in Cape Girardeau County, including Nell Holcomb.

Richard Bollwerk, acting superintendent of the Cape Girardeau School District, said the bill could hurt his district financially if a large number of low-income students go elsewhere.

That would reduce the number of students receiving school lunches for free or at a reduced cost. The number of students receiving such lunches is used in calculating some of the state funding that schools receive.

About 1,100 students in the Cape Girardeau school system currently qualify for the lunch program.

Even if the school-choice project would have little impact financially on the Cape Girardeau public schools, it would set a precedent in funding private schools, Bollwerk said.

Larry Beshears, superintendent of the Delta School District, said it be wrong for the state to provide such funding when private and parochial schools can limit which students they take.