By Blake Deshazo

The Selma Times-Journal

Two Dallas County schools will show their support for educational options next Wednesday by attending a School Choice Rally at the Capitol in Montgomery.

The Alabama Opportunity Scholarship Fund is encouraging people, whether they support school choice or not, to attend the rally.

“[The Alabama Accountability Act] was something that was controversial when it was passed, and lawmakers sort of went out on a limb to pass it,” said Sonya DiCarlo, AOSF director of communications.

“So it is important for everybody who supported it, those who didn’t and families that are confused about it. I think it is important for them to see visually the kind of impact that the law has had in its first year.”

When the law was passed in 2013 it opened up options for parents to take their students out of failing schools and place them in non-failing public schools or private schools.

The rally aims to raise awareness of the benefits of having different educational choices for students, DiCarlo said, and so far there are thousands of people are registered for the rally.

“We’ve gotten an incredible response,” DiCarlo said. “We have probably between 2,200 and 2,500 people that we know are coming, but we are expecting more, so there could be anywhere between 2,500 to 3,000 people that are going to be at the rally.”

Among those attending will be around 400 students, parents and educators from Ellwood Christian Academy and Meadowview Christian School.

“It is important for us to participate to show our support for school reform and school choice efforts that are being spearheaded not just here in the state of Alabama but nationwide,” said Gary Crum, headmaster of Ellwood.

Crum said the Alabama Accountability Act seems to be benefiting a lot of parents and students.

“It is not necessarily benefiting just private schools, but it’s benefiting parents who choose to homeschool their children,” Crum said. “It is just choice driven, and education should be choice driven as well.”

Rally participants will hear from students, parents, teachers and elected officials about why they support school choice. The rally will be held Wednesday, Jan. 28 at from 10 a.m. until 12 p.m. on the south lawn of the Capitol.