News and Press Releases for May 2007

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5/24/2007

Governor: Adopt Amendment to Improve Open Enrollment Bill

Governor Says Senate Needs to Address Bill's Shortcomings Through Grooms Amendment

Columbia, S.C. - Gov. Mark Sanford today issued the following statement on the open enrollment bill, set to be debated today in the S.C. Senate:

"We are pleased that the debate on choice in education has come as far as it has, because six years ago in my original campaign for Governor, one of our proposed public education reforms was in fact open enrollment," Gov. Sanford said. "The bill making its way through the legislative system now represents a real opportunity to do something profound in decoupling a young person's educational options from the neighborhood they happen to be born into - but it is key that we don't sign a bill that gives the mirage of an open system.

"We believe an open system is vital to not only allowing a student to move from a school that is not working for them to one that does, but to providing diverse choices in our educational system that match the diversity of kids in South Carolina schools. Unfortunately, we believe this bill in its current form is fundamentally flawed in the way it creates the promise of open enrollment but won't deliver a choice to help kids who are trapped in failing schools. Fortunately, there is still time to correct this, as Senator Grooms has an amendment that would give families other options when capacity isn't available in the public sector. We believe that amendment is needed if we are really going to provide parents and students with a variety of educational options for their children.

"While we continue to believe that only full-blown choice that includes both public and private educational options will give us the kind of vibrant educational marketplace we need as a state, Senator Grooms' amendment would be an important step toward offering children trapped in failing schools the same alternatives now afforded to more affluent classmates. As this debate begins in the Senate, we'd urge Senators to look at that amendment, as well as other ways of increasing the number of options available to South Carolina's parents and students."