LEWISTON, Maine - In a lecture titled "The Surprising Consensus on School Choice," education reform expert Jay P. Greene discusses his research at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 26, at the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, Bates College, Campus Avenue. The public is invited to this free event.

Greene is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, a conservative think tank in Manhattan, Fla. He has extensively researched school choice and voucher programs in several American cities, and has published his findings in The Public Interest, the New York Post and the Christian Science Monitor. He is also the author of the Manhattan Institute publication "The Education Freedom Index," a state-by-state ranking of how much choice is afforded to parents in educating their children.

Greene's studies have indicated that children who use vouchers to attend private schools fare better academically than those in public schools and that voucher programs encourage improvements in public schools. Finally, Greene writes, "private schools are more likely to be integrated and to promote civic virtues like tolerance than public schools."

A former professor of government at the University of Texas in Austin and the University of Houston, Greene lives in Weston, Fla.

Greene's appearance is part of "Difference . . . Race, Class, Gender, Etc.," a lecture series at Bates College. For more information, please call 207-786-6202.

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