Sunshine Sentinel

A fundamental component of educating our children is ensuring that we provide all students the opportunity to learn in an environment best tailored to their educational needs. In that spirit, we must continue prioritizing school choice.

The benefits of school choice cut across multiple aspects of the educational landscape. School choice increases student safety, maximizes parent participation, and provides low-income families with more options.

With respect to safety, research concluded that charter school students in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, were half as likely as their public school counterparts to commit crimes. Students in charter schools can focus solely on their coursework allowing them to develop academically and emotionally without the distractions of bullying, violence, and gang related activity.

Predictably, this results in improved educational outcomes that offer lifelong benefits to students who participate in school choice programs. The Florida Tax Credit scholarship program, for instance, led to  significant improvements in higher education enrollment and graduation rates for low-income students — a result that translates to enhanced economic opportunities for thousands of Florida students every year.

President Trump and his administration believe school choice is a civil rights issue and that no parent should be forced to send their child to a failing school.

This issue is personal to me. As a mom with two young children, it’s something that’s on my mind a great deal. President Trump and his administration have always prioritized the best interests of American students, and will continue to do so in a second term. The President forcefully laid out the clear contrast between himself and Joe Biden on this issue during his RNC acceptance speech. 

“Biden also vowed to oppose school choice and close all charter schools, ripping away the ladder of opportunity for Black and Hispanic children,” he said. “In a second term, I will expand charter schools and provide school choice to every family in America. And we will always treat our teachers with the tremendous respect that they deserve.” 

School choice is a cornerstone of the president’s second-term agenda because he understands the importance of allowing funding for education to follow each student to the academic setting of their choice — whether it is a charter, private, religious, or home school. In 2019, the Trump administration made a bold proposal to expand educational options for students of all economic backgrounds through the Education Freedom Scholarship. This initiative invests in students by providing up to $5 billion in tax credits for donations to state-based, locally-controlled scholarships. 

Another crucial component of educational success comes in the form of paid family leave. Parent involvement in their children’s education is vital to long-term academic success. The principles of innovative childcare reform and practices that increase access to quality care, choice, and flexibility for hard working Americans cannot be emphasized enough. President Trump is laser-focused on these issues and delivering for American families. 

The Trump administration is laying out principles for common sense, innovative childcare policy reforms and practices that increase access to quality care, choice, and flexibility for America’s working parents. These principles have an immediate impact on empowering families. Conversely, Joe Biden aspires for an American educational system where teachers’ unions — not students — reap the most benefits. Biden believes that American children ought to be denied access to a high-quality education solely because of their zip code, even going as far as saying charter schools would be “gone” if he is elected president. This is simply unacceptable. 

Let us also not forget that Donald Trump is the first president to include paid family leave in every budget he’s proposed. Additionally, his historic tax reforms provided a new tax credit to incentivize businesses to offer paid family leave to their employees, and the Trump administration coordinated with Congress to secure paid parental leave for all federal employees in the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act. 

President Trump will continue boldly leading on the key issues that matter most. The mainstream media will do their best to suppress his historic first-term achievements, but the facts are indisputable. If the American people want four more years of progress, they will vote to re-elect Donald J. Trump in November to keep putting American families first.

– Lara Trump is a Senior Advisor to Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.