You may have seen demonstrators wearing yellow scarves this week. That’s because it is National School Choice Week. Every year, the school-choice movement takes a week in January to spread the word, and PragerU has a video showing why it matters.
Many visible public figures are also taking time to recognize school choice this week. Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R., Wisc.) and Senator Tim Scott (R., S.C.) spoke at the event in Washington D.C., and others, such as Texas governor Greg Abbott and New Hampshire governor Chris Sununu, supported local events in their home states.
Ultimately, though, School Choice Week derives its strength from the grassroots volunteers who organize these events in town squares and school houses around the country. As of today, School Choice Week 2017 has over 21,000 events planned, with an estimated 6 million attendees, in all 50 states.
With numbers like that, one might question why the event does not receive anywhere near the media attention of events such as the Women’s March, which included 3-4 million protesters. Nevertheless, the word is beginning to spread. Juan Williams and the Washington Post, among others, deserve credit for noting the movement’s widespread support, and polls increasingly show the depth of the support: School choice has had approval numbers above two-thirds for years.
That support should be enough to quiet critics on the left who paint charters, vouchers, and tax-credits as a right-wing plot to get rich. But the public-school establishment retains vigorous control of the debate, forcing the yellow scarves to reemerge again this year to help continue getting the word out.






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