The wit and wisdom of John Huppenthal: Private schools are public schools

by David Safier

At last Thursday's Ed Superintendent candidate forum, John Huppenthal repeated something he's said before. He said private schools are public schools.

The reason is — get ready for this — students in private schools are members of the public, so that makes the schools public schools, since they serve the public.

Got that?

Here's what Huppenthal said as part of his response to a question about private school tuition tax credits:

My belief is that all children are members of the public, and every child, by giving parents more power, you're going to get better outcomes and you'll get the best outcome for all students.

Right. And by the same token, all consumers are members of the public, so WalMart is a public store and deserves public funding.

And all members of private golf clubs are members of the public, so private golf courses are public golf courses, and the members should get state vouchers to help pay their fees.

If Huppenthal wins, I guess he'll consider himself Superintendent of All Arizona Schools. Which means, I suppose, under his administration, private schools will be subject to the same rules and regulations as public schools.

Sorry, my bad. Hupp means, private schools will be recipients of the same state funding as public schools.

Just before the statement above, Huppenthal said this:

Well, I think it's unethical for somebody who's running for Superintendent of Public Instruction to define some children, some students, as not being worthy of support.

This is truly incredible. By "worthy of support," Hupp means financial support, of course. That means, if a family opts out of public, government funded schools, the state should be obligated to "support" that student anyway, by paying for his/her education.

Which means, I suppose, if a gated community builds its own private roads, the state should be obligated to "support" those roads by maintaining them. Same idea, right?

You know what it sounds like to me? It sounds like ultra conservative John Huppenthal is saying children in private school are entitled to state education funds.

Entitled. Entitlement. Aren't those swear words in the conservative lexicon?

1 thought on “The wit and wisdom of John Huppenthal: Private schools are public schools”

  1. Well said, Dave. Huppenthal is an idiot. Any news about his “lab school” As I expected I have not heard from him or his office.

Comments are closed.