Why Matt Damon should support school choice

By Gloria Romero (From the Orange County Register, September 10th, 2013) September is back-to-school time for millions of kids, so I decided to write this open letter to actor Matt Damon. Dear Mr. Damon: I am a fan of yours! I recently saw your movie Elysium, which actually prompted me to write to you. For those who haven't seen the film, it's a science fiction-type story set in 2154, where two classes of people exist: the haves and the have-nots, and how those with money and resources no longer live side by side with mere Earthlings. They have their world, an orbiting space station, replete with pristine neighborhoods, health care and, although no mention was made of it, presumably, the best schools. The poor, earthbound people can only live miserable lives or try to escape their horrible conditions and get to Elysium. Of course, politicians and state laws block them. Your movie got me thinking about how you recently endured scathing criticism after revealing that you planned to enroll your children in private schools in the Los Angeles area. Not one California public school was progressive enough for your kids. Sending our kids in my family to private school was a big, big, big deal. but we don't have a choice, you lamented. Critics attacked you. Time magazine called it the Bourne Hypocrisy. Ordinarily, it's not big news for rich movie stars to send their kids to swanky private schools. But critics targeted you because of your leading role in real life in the big 2011 Save Our Schools Rally in Washington, D.C. Sponsored by national teacher unions, the event attacked the Obama administration and education reformers for supporting greater teacher accountability and parental choice in deciding where their kids go to school. With your impassioned speech, you became their darling. Your speech even, sadly, fueled vicious attacks by Democrats against other Democrats for supporting parental choice in education. You proclaimed you loved public school teachers. Now, though, it seems that you don't want them teaching your kids.

Mr. Damon: I fully support your right to choose what is best for your children including private education. Indeed, parents should be the architects of their children's futures. That's why I wrote California's Parent Trigger, Open Enrollment and Districts of Choice to give parents rights in a state that somewhat like Elysium operates two separate and unequal education systems: Children from families without money are forced to attend a government-assigned school even if it is identified as chronically underperforming; those with money get to bypass constricting state laws and take their children to private schools. You justified your decision to bypass public schools by stating you didn't have a choice. Actually, you did: It's called being rich. The people who really don't have a choice are those millions of parents who are assigned to a school simply by ZIP code even if that school is considered a dropout factory. Fathers like Hamlet Garcia of Philadelphia face going to prison because he enrolled his child in an affluent district where he didn't live. Mothers like Kelley Williams-Bolar of Ohio actually served time. And they're not alone. Where's their choice? On the heels of the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech, we have two American education worlds just like in your movie. But if choice is good for you and it is then why shouldn't we extend it to all parents? Why condemn Earthling parents because they can't buy their way out? I propose we work together to give all parents real rights to choose what's best for their children's education and, in this process, improve all schools. Given the distressing message of your movie, we should start soon.