Today the ACLU of Nevada sent this letter to the CCSD Board of Trustees in support of the resolution to support and protect students regardless of documentation status.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 25, 2017
Las Vegas, NV – While speaking at a school choice rally in Carson City today, Senator Scott Hammond was quoted as saying, “the school choice movement has been called the civil rights issue of our time.” This could not be further from the truth. The voucher scheme in Nevada is nothing more than taxpayer dollars funding private and discriminatory education.
“Considering the racist history of vouchers, Senator Hammond’s statement that school choice ‘has been called the civil rights issue of our time’ diminishes real discrimination and is an insult to the millions of Americans who have actually been discriminated against for centuries. No family or individual is discriminated against when laws promoting raiding state coffers to pay for their private education are found unconstitutional. Families already have the right to choose a private education, just not with taxpayer money,” said Tod Story, executive director.
Amy Rose, Legal Director of the ACLU of Nevada said: “Many of the voucher eligible schools engage in discriminatory practices on a daily basis. Private schools in Nevada will reject or dis-enroll a student who is LGBTQ, or whose parents are LGBTQ. As one voucher eligible school puts it, students must ‘refrain from participating in. . . homosexuality or other sexual perversions . . .’ Another will refuse admission to any student for simply ““supporting or condoning . . . homosexual activity.” Moreover, many of these schools refuse to accommodate students with special needs, and will not accept a student unless they adhere to a certain faith,” said Amy Rose, legal director of the ACLU of Nevada.
If private schools receive public funds they will be granted public money to discriminate as they please based on their own beliefs and prejudices. Nevada taxpayers should be forced to fund this “school choice” scam.
