The State is pulling out all the stops to discredit Gov. Mark Sanford’s education reform proposal, “Put Parents in Charge.” Last week alone, there was an editorial that condemned Gov. Sanford for having ventured to Milwaukee on an education fact-finding mission, as well as a deceptive headline and article “reporting” on the trip.

The editorial went so far as to say that the governor (and by extension, those who accompanied him) was “wasting his time.” Meanwhile, the article would have one believe that none of the participants were impressed by Milwaukee’s turnaround and that school choice was not a viable option for South Carolina. Quite to the contrary.

Gov. Sanford accepted an invitation and organized a visit to Milwaukee because it was an opportunity for him and members of the General Assembly to learn more about a school system that has turned from troubled to successful through innovative reforms that expanded parents’ options, increased student achievement and lifted public school performance.

I went on the trip to Milwaukee with a number of my fellow legislators. Before going, I was lukewarm at best on the topic of school choice. Upon returning, the vast majority of those who attended, including me, can be counted as staunch advocates for school choice. After seeing and hearing firsthand how Milwaukee’s school-choice program benefited these kids and their families, as well as the public schools, any skepticism I had was erased.

These are the facts:

• School choice improves graduation rates. I had this explained to me again and again by people in the system. When I returned from Milwaukee, I learned that researcher Jay Greene, a former professor at the University of Texas and currently an analyst at the Manhattan Institute, had found that students who exercised school choice were almost twice as likely as others to graduate high school. Since South Carolina has the lowest high school graduation rate in the nation, perhaps we could learn something from a system that has dramatically curtailed the number of dropouts.

n The kids who stay in school seem to be learning more. Large-scale increases in reading, math, science and social studies scores have been documented by researchers from Harvard, Princeton and the University of Wisconsin. And parents and children participating in school choice in Milwaukee all told us that grades have improved. That’s what impressed me the most — having a parent and child tell me directly that this reform is working.

n Poor and minority parents can make choices just as well as wealthy or white ones if given the opportunity. A particularly nasty charge leveled against Gov. Sanford — in both The State’s editorial and its article — is that his school-choice proposal benefits the well-off while neglecting the concerns of the poor and minorities. This is absolutely false. “Put Parents in Charge” gives them an opportunity, something they don’t have under the current system. Many defenders of the status quo say that these populations can never reasonably expect to produce high achievers. On my trip to Milwaukee, I saw classrooms filled with well-disciplined, attentive, enthusiastic students of every color. When I asked their teachers about achievement levels, I was shown their results. They were rock-solid. What was the secret? Involved and empowered parents made all the difference, I was told.

Every parent I spoke to said that school choice had improved the schools and that reactions to their concerns were more attentive and responsive. When I got home, I checked the Federal Education Resources and Information Clearinghouse and found that studies had proven parental satisfaction had increased in Milwaukee. In short, everything that I saw and heard was true — this was no dog-and-pony show.

Everything that I learned about school choice in Milwaukee reinforced that it was a good idea. School choice lowered dropout rates, raised student achievement and gave parents new options while increasing their satisfaction.

Competition has improved the schools in Milwaukee and could do so here. If the opponents of choice would approach the education problem in the spirit of inquiry and thoughtful analysis, they, too, would be converted — just as I and others who went on the trip have been.

Sen. Thomas represents Greenville County in the S.C. Senate.