Republican leaders provided $10,000,000 in publicly financed school vouchers for private schools, funds that could have been used to increase funding for the public schools. The voucher program provides tuition of $4,200 per year or 90% of the annual private school tuition cost, whichever is less, to children of low income families. A thoughtful analysis of the program indicated that children from many low income families, struggling to make ends meet, would not be able to use the program, since (1) the annual tuition at most private schools is greater than $4,200 per year, (2) many of these families would not be able to provide transportation for their children to the private schools, and (3) some private schools require that students purchase their textbooks. The major issue, however, is whether public money should be used to support private education.
The North Carolina voucher program was modeled from the program in Wisconsin, which has had a private school voucher program for several years. From the taxpayer’s perspective, however, the Wisconsin program is problematical. First of all, the program was originally promoted as a way for low income students to have access to private education. But in the last two legislative sessions, the program was broadened to include children of families from higher income levels. Secondly, some for-profit private schools in Wisconsin have registered students, kept them in class until just after the date when enrollment was counted for funding purposes, and then sent them back to the public schools. Also, school data from Wisconsin show that students receiving vouchers and attending private schools performed no better, and in some cases worse, than students attending public schools.
$24.8 million was allocated for the voucher program for the 2016-17 school year. The budget recently approved by the General Assembly substantially expands the program. The plan is to spend $44.8 million on vouchers for the 2017-18 school year, and to increase the amount by $10 million each year until the 2027-28 year, when the amount plateaus at $144.8 million. Thus over the next eleven years, a total of $1,042,800,000 of taxpayer money will be funneled to private schools. This billion dollar funding should be used to support our public schools!!
Voting 2016 