During the Florida gubernatorial campaign, most voters were paying attention to then-candidate Rick Scott's past?as head of a hospital chain that paid $1.7 billion in fines in the largest Medicare fraud case in history. Now that Scott is the governor-elect, those voters (and?the press)?are turning their focus to the policy plans he released several months ago. Ron Matus, reporting for the St. Petersburg Times, notes that Scott's education plan ?includes other ideas that push the envelope, including creation of online charter schools and allowing students to advance to the next subject or grade level as soon as they've mastered the material.? The first envelope-pushing idea?is for?so-called ?educational savings accounts? that would allow state education money to follow students to the schools parents choose. Matus writes that ?A draft of the plan that surfaced Friday, written by [Patricia] Levesque,? a member of Scott's education team, ?says parents of eligible students would receive 85 percent of the state's per-pupil funding figure, which is $6,843 this year.? State senator Alan Hays said of the plan, ?I love it.? The Washington Post's Valerie Strauss doesn't.
?Liam Julian, Bernard Lee Schwartz Policy Fellow