Weekly Writers Round-Up: A School Choice Win, Post-COVID Healthcare, and Traffic Cameras as Policing Reform

Each week, we’ll be featuring opinion pieces from the alumni and current participants of AF’s Writing Fellows Program. A few highlights from the past week are below. Do you dream of having bylines like these? Learn more about how the Writing Fellows Program can help boost your writing career.

School choice wins in a crucial moment by Satya Marar (Spring 2020) in the Washington Examiner
The Supreme Court delivered a landmark victory for parents, students, and advocates of religious freedom alike on Tuesday by striking down a Montana law that prevented a private school tax credit scholarship program from including religious schools. The decision has the potential to neutralize the “Blaine Amendments” found in more than 30 state constitutions that restrict the participation of religiously affiliated schools in publicly funded education choice programs…

A commonsense solution for health care coverage in the wake of the pandemic by Elise Amez-Droz (Summer 2019) in The Hill
The COVID-19 pandemic – and the policy response to it – has disrupted the lives and insurance status of millions of Americans. Unfortunately, for individuals who have either lost their employer-based coverage unexpectedly or never had coverage in the first place, the conventional options for obtaining coverage now are limited. 

It’s time more Americans took a look at an entirely different type of coverage: Short-term renewable health insurance…

Speed cameras work, may help reduce unnecessary police encounters by Nolan Gray (Fall 2015) in the Orange County Register
Back in mid-May, in the throes of an ongoing coronavirus pandemic, a curious yellow robotic dog swept across social media. Deployed by the Singaporean government in the island nation’s public spaces, the camera-mounted robotic dog was tasked with gently nudging park patrons to respect social distancing guidance with kind verbal reminders. The reaction was swift and universally derisive—prompting comparisons to the dystopian science fiction series “Black Mirror.”

But did the friendly robotic dog get a fair hearing? In a way, that brief debate over how we enforce the rules foreshadowed our present national crisis. In the aftermath of the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor by police officers, many are now calling for reforms that would remove the police from whole categories of law enforcement. In light of the ongoing carnage, would a few more friendly robotic dogs nudging against bad behavior really be so bad?…