The question of where the young daughters of President-elect Barack Obama and Michelle Obama will attend school took center stage in the transition process this week.
The Obamas were in Washington to meet with President George W. Bush and first lady Laura Bush at the White House. During that trip, Mrs. Obama toured at least two private schools in Washington for the couple’s daughters, Malia and Sasha, who are in the 5th and 2nd grades, respectively, at the private University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, not far from their home.
The president-elect had said in a press conference that Mrs. Obama would be in charge of scouting out schools. On Nov. 10, she visited Georgetown Day School, an independent school founded in 1945 as one of the city’s first integrated schools, and the Sidwell Friends School, a private, Quaker school that Chelsea Clinton attended. One of Vice President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s granddaughters also attends that school.
The Obamas are also rumored to be considering the Maret School, another independent private school in the city. Elementary tuition for those schools this year is as much as $28,000.
Dan Lips, a senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a think tank in Washington, said he hoped that researching the options available in the nation’s capital might make Mr. Obama reconsider his position on private school vouchers, which he opposed during the presidential campaign.
“I hope this experience of trying to find a quality school in D.C. would make President-elect Obama and Michelle Obama sympathetic to the other parents in D.C. who aren’t as fortunate” as they are, Mr. Lips said.
If the Obama girls end up in private school, their father would not be the first president to oppose vouchers while sending his children to private school, Mr. Lips said. President Bill Clinton also opposed private school vouchers.
President Jimmy Carter, who sent his daughter, Amy, to Washington public schools, told an interviewer in 1993 that he was “very disappointed” with the Clintons’ choice of a private school for Chelsea.
But others say that a presidential family should make the best educational decision for the children involved.
Jay P. Greene, a supporter of private school vouchers and a professor of education reform at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville, said he didn’t see any inherent contradiction in policymakers’ opposing vouchers while sending their own children to private school.
“It may be bad policy to oppose vouchers, but it isn’t hypocrisy to do so while choosing a private school for oneself,” Mr. Greene wrote in an e-mail. He likened the decision to supporting generous funding for public transportation, while owning a pricey car.
Charter Options
Mary Lord, a member of the District of Columbia board of education who represents the neighborhood in which the White House is located, agreed that the Obamas’ choice is ultimately personal, not political. She said she has sent her own children to private, traditional public, and charter schools in the city.
But she urged the incoming first family at least to consider the 49,000-student school system’s traditional public schools and charter schools.
“I would encourage the Obamas to at least pop in the door of a few of our outstanding public and public charter schools,” Ms. Lord said. “If you don’t know what’s behind the closed door, you’re not really making an informed decision.”
She suggested the family look at Anthony Hyde Elementary School in the city’s storied Georgetown neighborhood and Strong John Thomson Elementary School, which offers Chinese-language instruction. “These are all fantastic schools within spitting distance of the White House,” she said.
Sara Mead, a senior research fellow at the New America Foundation, a Washington think tank, suggested that the Obamas consider public charter schools.
“I don’t think it matters at all politically” which school the Obamas choose, she said. “I don’t think anybody will actually be angry with them if they don’t send their kids to a public school. I do think if they sent their kids to a charter school, that would have enormous value to the charter school movement.”
Mr. Obama voiced support for charter schools during the campaign, saying he would like to double federal funding for them, from $200 million to $400 million.
Ms. Mead suggested the Obamas take a look at Capital City Charter School, in Washington’s diverse Columbia Heights neighborhood. She said it might be a good fit since it serves poor students, as well the children of more affluent, educated professionals.
