Children in Detroit desperately need more choices when it comes to their education, but bills currently making their way through Lansing would do just the opposite, as Mackinac Center Director of Education Policy Ben DeGrow wrote in a recent Letter to the Editor.

In the letter, published by The Detroit News, DeGrow explains that a set of bills approved last month by the Senate would create the Detroit Education Commission, adding another layer of bureaucracy and limiting school options for families.

Rather than double down on more centralized authority, let a thousand flowers bloom. There really are only two options: either have a politically appointed board determine what’s best for Detroit schoolchildren (something that’s clearly failed in the past), or empower families to decide for themselves. A free market of educational providers — one where good schools are rewarded with more students and funding and bad schools are closed — can work in Detroit, if given a chance.

Read the letter in its entirety at The Detroit News.

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