Pastor Joshua C. Robertson says Nikole Hannah-Jones’s regret over sending her daughter to an underperforming public school bolsters his school-choice case. He says families need public funding for alternatives and cites universal school-choice programs in 18 states.
Robertson says Hannah-Jones had rejected education-freedom policies because she believed they perpetuated injustice. He says she later recognized that she had put her personal ideology ahead of her daughter's educational opportunities.
Robertson, a Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, pastor and founder of Black Pastors United for Education, says three-quarters of Black families want education freedom. He puts the chance that a single mother's public school in New York City or Philadelphia is underperforming at 40% to 60%, and says better private or religious schools may be unaffordable. He also says more than 600 Black and Hispanic pastors in Texas want to build schools families could pay for with taxpayer dollars.
