School Choice Is About Opportunity—and It Shouldn’t Be a Privilege

For generations, having a real choice in where to send your child to school has often been a privilege—not a right.

Families with financial means could pay for private school tuition. Others could move to a neighborhood with highly rated schools, knowing their new ZIP code would unlock opportunities their previous one could not. But for many families, those options were simply out of reach.

School Choice Week is a moment to pause and reflect on how that reality is beginning to change and why that matters so deeply for students and families across the country.

Today, more parents are being offered something powerful: options. Not a one-size-fits-all system, but the opportunity to choose a school that truly fits their child. Because children are not one-size-fits-all.

One child might thrive in a small, close-knit learning environment where all of the teachers know them by name and confidence grows alongside academics. Another might come alive in a school centered on the arts, where theater, music, or visual storytelling aren’t extracurriculars but part of daily learning.

That’s true in my own experience as well.

My daughter learns best in a smaller setting. She’s also absolutely obsessed with music and the arts. She attends an out of boundary public school that nurtures both how she learns and what she loves and it makes a world of difference. Just a few roads down, my friend’s child attends a dual-language program in a local charter school becoming fluent in both Spanish and English while developing a strong sense of cultural identity.

Those students are different. Their needs are different. And their schools reflect that.

That’s what school choice—done well—is really about.

It’s not about ranking schools against one another or pitting systems against each other. It’s about recognizing a simple truth: students thrive when they’re in environments designed for who they are.

And those environments can take many forms.

For some families, the best fit is a strong traditional public school in their district. For others, it might be a Montessori magnet school that emphasizes independence and hands-on learning. Some students benefit from a public charter school with a dual-language focus, while others find their place in a microschool that blends academics with real-world, career-connected learning—like preparing students for future engineering or technology careers.

What matters isn’t the label on the building.

What matters is whether the school works for the student inside it.

School Choice Week is a celebration of that idea: that families deserve access to public education options that reflect their children’s strengths, interests, and learning styles—without needing wealth, privilege, or a move across town to make it happen.

It’s also a reminder that strong public education doesn’t come in just one form. It comes in many. And when families can find the right fit, students are more engaged, more confident, and better prepared for what comes next.

This week, we celebrate the growing opportunity for families to choose schools that meet their children where they are—and help them become who they’re meant to be.

Because having options shouldn’t be a privilege.

It should be part of a public education system that works for every child.

‍