ELECTIONS ’92 : Bush Outlines School Pilot Proposal : Education: The plan would give children more choice among public, private and religious schooling and provide $1,000 vouchers.

Staking an election year claim on a plan to make schools more competitive, President Bush on Thursday put forward the details of his $500-million pilot plan to offer schoolchildren more choice among public, private and religious education.

Bush said the proposal would serve as a “giant step forward” for American schools. He defended the plan against critics uncomfortable with using taxpayers’ money to subsidize church schools.

“No one told the GIs they couldn’t go to SMU or Notre Dame or Yeshiva or Harvard,” Bush said, likening the plan to federal programs that helped millions of veterans attend colleges of their choice. “Whether it’s public, private or religious, parents, not government, will choose their children’s schools.”

The plan would provide $1,000 vouchers to help pay for the schooling of low- and middle-income children who Bush said too often have no option but to attend inferior neighborhood schools. Proponents contend the competition would force public schools to improve or close; opponents say using federal funds for private and parochial schools would worsen public schools’ budget shortfalls.

Administration officials conceded that the start-up plan could provide vouchers for only a small percentage of the nation’s eligible children. They also acknowledged that the so-called “GI Bill for Children” stands no chance of passage in an election year.

But the proposal served at least to add clarity to the call for educational “choice” that has been a somewhat vague refrain of Bush’s reelection campaign, and to distinguish Bush from his rivals.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, favors using taxpayer funds only to expand choices among public schools. Texas billionaire Ross Perot, who is contemplating an independent run for the White House, has not taken a position on vouchers. But he has said that the wealth or poverty of a neighborhood should not determine the quality of its schools--that spending among public schools should be equalized.

Under the Bush proposal, states, cities or local school districts would apply to the Education Department for a share of the $500 million made available each year.

The recipients of the grants would provide $1,000 vouchers to children in families whose total earnings fell below the national or state median income of about $40,000 a year.

Roman Catholic educators praised the President’s plan. “Low- and middle-income families who cannot afford to live in the best neighborhoods with the best public schools now will have an opportunity to exercise a right the rich have always had--choosing schools for their youngsters,” Robert Kealy, the National Catholic Educational Assn.’s executive director for elementary schools, said in a prepared statement.

But James W. Guthrie, a UC Berkeley education professor, said he didn’t think that $1,000 would be enough to induce many low-income families to switch to private schools. “It looks like another subsidy for the rich or upper-middle class,” said Guthrie, who is co-director of Policy Analysis for California Education, or PACE, a nonprofit think tank. “I think it will be politically popular with Bush’s constituency but it won’t improve education a twit.”

The American Federation of Teachers president, Albert Shanker, agreed. “There’s not very much you can buy in education for $1,000 a year,” he said.

At Catholic schools in the Los Angeles area, the average annual tuition is $1,200 for elementary school students and $2,400 for high schoolers, according to archdiocese spokesman Bill Rivera. He described the White House proposals as “a positive step” but said that $2,000 vouchers would be “much more helpful.” About 100,000 students attend Catholic schools in the archdiocese, which includes Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties.

Even private schools are not unanimously in favor of vouchers. Although most would welcome the money, some fear that it would come with strings that would rob them of their independence.

Education experts also question whether private schools are better than public ones. Julia Koppich, deputy director of PACE, said recent data shows there is little difference in educational achievement between students of similar socioeconomic backgrounds who attend the different systems. “It’s pretty much a wash,” she said.

But advocates like Chip Miller of the Institute for Justice contend that “every little increment (toward school choice) is significant.”

The debate over providing federal aid to church schools is likely to be intensified by this week’s Supreme Court decision reaffirming the barrier against religious observances in public schools. But Education Secretary Lamar Alexander said the Administration saw no legal barrier to its plan, and Bush responded with scorn to his critics.

“I don’t hear an outcry because poor children at Catholic schools get their lunch paid for by federal taxpayers,” he said.

Last January the Senate rejected Bush’s more modest proposal to spend $30 million on school choice demonstration projects, 56 to 37.

But Administration officials insisted Thursday that the momentum toward school choice had become inexorable and suggested that the November election could offer voters a chance to give a mandate to Bush’s proposal.

“The Berlin Wall came down after awhile, and this will pass just as suddenly,” Alexander told reporters at a White House briefing. He called the proposal “the best chance we have for a revolution in American education.”

Jehl reported from Washington, Merl from Los Angeles. Times education writer Larry Gordon also contributed to this story.