<p>It doesn’t seem to be legal for a state to turn away children who want to go to school, but in New Orleans, we don’t have the buildings, the teachers or the books, so school’s out indefinitely for at least 300 kids. </p>
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<p>On a side note, if not for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, which is educating about 1500 children whose parents can’t afford to pay tuition, the number would be much, much higher. Before the public school system got schools running, the Archdiocese put together schools in portable trailers, using platoon shifts, and took children in regardless of the parents’ ability to pay. Even with other other schools open, fewer paying students than before the storm, and massive rebuilding costs ahead, it has not asked any child to leave over tuition.</p>
<p>I wonder what the government’s plans are in this case. The most obvious short term solution is to provide vouchers for private schooling since the public schools are full, but this of course won’t please the parents who aren’t satisfied with the schools run by the Archdiocese but can’t afford any private secular school. The vouchers for the students forced to attend the Archdiocese-run schools would really help them out since they aren’t getting much tuition at all now.</p>
<p>I wonder whether students at nearby colleges such as Tulane could organize some group tutoring in school subjects to hold kids over until the schools open again so that the students won’t find themselves far behind once they get back into normal schools.</p>
<p>“It doesn’t seem to be legal for a state to turn away children who want to go to school”</p>
<p>If there’s a legal right to a free public education, then it’s a state-conferred right – there is no constitutional right to that effect. I don’t know Louisiana law, but according to the article, there is no such state right, and that doesn’t surprise me.</p>
<p>This is such an ongoing embarrassment to the nation. We can’t do any better than this?</p>