John Engler Quotes

I believe there ought to be school choice, so that parents can choose within the public school system.

Arizona is a national leader in school choice with both charter schools and tuition tax credits giving parents and their children more school choices than ever before.

Yes, I believe in school choice. Parents know far better than government bureaucrats what their children need from an education standpoint, and they should be permitted to make that choice.

Keep the Federal skunk out of our schools.

One of my main legislative efforts in education is to help expand and replicate successful charter schools. Charter schools are public schools with site-based governance.

Public schools in the late '80s and early '90s were a total mess... we felt that if I was going to have a good educational option in my life, I would have to go to a public school district that actually served its children.

The role of the federal government, if any, is to create more school choice.

I'll continue to fight for school choice and home schooling. Do I believe in accountability? You bet I do.

I envision presenting parents with a marketplace of school choices - public, private, parochial, charter, virtual, blended, and home education. They then can choose the model that best equips their children for success.

I made a different decision to send my children to the local state school.

Schools should be open. If it's a public education, and the school in your district is poor-performing, you should be able to put your student or kid wherever you want.

The White House, in advancing the agenda for a [school] "choice" plan, rests its faith on market mechanisms. What reason have the black and very poor to lend their credence to a market system that has proved so obdurate and so resistant to their pleas at every turn?

As the son of a union activist and a lifelong Democrat, I've always thought that privatizing our public schools is not the answer. We must strengthen public schools.

I'm a very big public school advocate.

The difference between the denominational system and the public school system is all the difference between bolstering them up on the one hand and letting them alone of the other.

When I was mayor of New York, my views changed. I began as mayor of New York City thinking that I could reform the New York City school system. After two or three years, four years, I became an advocate of choice, of scholarships, and vouchers, and parental choice, because I thought that was the only way to really change the school system.

In my mind, there is no reason public school reform should be a partisan issue.

The number one issue facing cities isn’t crimes or jobs anymore, it’s public education.

The problems of public schools will not be solved by cutting off the source of their funding, which is what vouchers are.

When people lose faith in a system as they have in the public school system, they no longer want to support it.

We should make sure that every student has at least one alternative—and preferably several—to her neighborhood school.

I grew up in the public schools, my mom taught in them, and then my daughter is in them.

Education is largely run at the state level.

The public education landscape is enriched by having many options - neighborhood public schools, magnet schools, community schools, schools that focus on career and technical education, and even charter schools.

The vast majority of students in this country will continue to attend public schools.