Even if It Fails, Prop. 174 Is a Wake-Up Call

If the pollsters are right, the California electorate Tuesday will emphatically reject the notion of spending vast sums of tax dollars at private schools.

Voters will spurn Proposition 174, the school voucher initiative, and the education Establishment will breathe more easily. No longer will public schools be threatened with losing $1 billion-plus to the private schools. And the California Teachers Assn., having spent roughly $14 million to defeat the measure, can fold its ample checkbook until the next election.

Public education will have escaped the electorate’s version of corporal punishment.

But any sense of euphoria or smugness will not be warranted. In most voters’ minds, this election is not a referendum on public schools, despite the attempt of voucher advocates to turn it into that. If it were, Proposition 174 would win in a landslide.

Voters who oppose the measure do so mainly because they fear it would destroy public schools by draining off needed tax dollars, The Times Poll found. They also don’t like the idea of public funds going to unregulated private schools.

But only 4% of those who reject Proposition 174 actually like the current public school system. And just 1% feel that new school reforms are adequate. Similarly, the Field Poll found that only 5% of the measure’s opponents believe “public schools are doing the best they can.” And just 3% think “things are OK the way they are.”

So Californians have no great esteem for their public schools. Some backers of Proposition 174 already are talking about sponsoring a new, improved voucher proposal in 1994. And next time, the voters may be more receptive--depending on whether the education Establishment views its battle over Proposition 174 as a whopping win or a wake-up call.

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Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco), the CTA’s strongest legislative ally and a big beneficiary of its campaign checkbook, says the voucher initiative definitely has been a wake-up call. He wants the Legislature next year to concentrate on education reform as it did the business climate this year. The Speaker plans to hold an “education summit” modeled after his successful economic summit in February.

“There’ll be no sacred cows,” he vows. Even teacher tenure? “No sacred cows--on anything. It’s all on the table. If you’re going to reform the system, you’ve got to examine the whole system.”

But don’t expect Democrats who control the Legislature to tamper with teacher tenure. Critics complain it protects poor teachers, but tenure is sacrosanct with the CTA.

“A good principal will fire a bad teacher, but many cowardly principals don’t want to go through that process,” says Assemblywoman Delaine Eastin (D-Fremont), chairwoman of the Assembly Education Committee and a 1994 candidate for state schools chief. “We ought to do a better job early on of figuring out which teachers are going to make it and which aren’t.”

She adds: “I’ve never been to a great school that doesn’t have a great principal. We need to do more leadership training. We can’t just say: ‘You’ve been here 20 years. It’s time to get your ticket punched. You’re now a principal.’ ”

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Everybody agrees schools must do more to encourage parental involvement. But that’s becoming increasingly difficult with the pressures on time and energy faced by two-income families and single parents.

“Only 10% of the kids today live in ‘Ozzie and Harriet’ families, with a dad who works and a mom who stays home and takes care of them,” notes Maureen DiMarco, Gov. Pete Wilson’s education adviser. “Everything begins at home. And what destroys the home more than anything else in Southern California is that long commute.”

Schools obviously must be made safer. The Los Angeles school board became a statewide laughingstock when it actually debated whether students packing guns should be expelled. There may be a need for metal detectors, tall fences and more guards. But a return to old-fashioned discipline also would help.

“Troublemaking kids ought to be thrown out of school,” says Steven A. Merksamer, a Republican activist and former Gov. George Deukmejian’s chief of staff. “In fact, I was actually thrown out once for being a loudmouth and obnoxious. You know the kind of kid. It was good for me.”

There are plenty of good ideas, some of them controversial: Stricter academic requirements, standardized student testing to evaluate teachers and make them more accountable, merit pay for the best teachers, better vocational training, more use of computer technology and increased local control. Also, enthusiastic implementation by local boards of new charter school and public school voucher programs.

If the pollsters are right, public schools will be given another chance. It may be their last.