| 4/14/2009 6:19:00 AM | Email this article • Print this article |
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| Vonette Davis picks up her son Julio Davis from St. Thomas More School in Southeast Washington. Julio Davis is a D.C. Opportunity Scholarship student at the school. His mother is actively working to save the scholarship program that will end following the 2009-10 school year unless it is reauthorized by Congress and the D.C. City Council. |
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Mother promises her son to 'do whatever I can do' to save D.C. Opportunity Scholarships
Vonette Davis said if she can't give her son anything else, she wants to give him a good education.
"No Nikes, no PlayStation," just a good education, she said. Julio Davis is a fifth grader at St. Thomas More School in Southeast Washington, where his mother said he is flourishing.
"My son is in band, extracurricular activities, he likes school and he likes his teacher," she said, adding that he likes to learn and he is a very bright student. "He asked me if he will be there (St. Thomas More School) until the eighth grade. I told him I would do whatever I can do."
Vonette Davis, a 34-year-old single mother one day hopes to become an interior designer. She currently can't work because she suffers from a serious neurological autoimmune disease. Without the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, she would not have the money to send her son to St. Thomas More School.
The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, passed by Congress as a pilot program five years ago, gives low-income families the ability to choose a non-public school for their children by providing them with monetary assistance of up to $7,500 for each child. Recent congressional action will end the program following the 2009-10 school year unless it is reauthorized by Congress and the D.C. City Council. The average annual income for families in the program is $22,736.
Just a couple weeks ago, Vonette Davis and her son had a chance to speak with D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty in person about the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program that provides a way for Julio to go to Catholic school. Davis urged the mayor to support the program that keeps her son from attending a failing neighborhood school in Southeast Washington, an area of the city that has a high crime rate. In an interview afterward, she said she hopes the mayor will "stand in front of the House of Representatives and say this (program) will make a difference ... That will show this is important to us."
Davis said another reason she will fight to keep her son in St. Thomas More is because it is a safe environment, and a place where her son can learn more easily.
"The classes are a little smaller, and the atmosphere is totally different (than other neighborhood schools)," she said. Davis added that she only wants to give her child the opportunities that parents with more money can give their children.
Father Raymond Moore, the pastor of St. Thomas More Parish and School, said parents of Opportunity Scholarship students want "the best for their children ... They want to give their children what parents who have better financial resources can give their children."
Father Moore said people at his parish are writing letters, signing petitions and calling city leadership in support of the program.
The pastor said the scholarship program provides a "vital connection" for many of the city's children to learn about Jesus. "Catholic education provides a connection with the Church and a relationship with Jesus Christ," he said. It also provides "social justice opportunities and educational quality that is superior."
He added that ending the program could have a "devastating" impact on Catholic schools that would feel the effects of losing large numbers of Opportunity Scholarship students. Today, 879 of 1,700 Opportunity Scholarship students are attending Catholic elementary and high schools in the District. At the archdiocese's six inner-city schools, these students constitute from one-quarter to two-thirds of the total enrollment.
In an earlier interview with the Catholic Standard, Father Moore said the program "is life-changing and in some cases life-saving. Students are able to flourish in a positive ... Catholic setting."
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