A bill was filed in the Tennessee legislature to establish vouchers for students in Shelby County. It would divert $18 million from the district, which is already one of the most fiscally disadvantaged districts in the nation.
The voucher program would deepen the fiscal distress of the district. With the amount of the vouchers, students would not be accepted at first-rate private schools but at low-quality religious schools that teach creationism.
The bill, filed by Sen. Brian Kelsey, R-Germantown, includes language that only students in districts with at least 30 schools in the bottom 5 percent in the state in academic performance would be eligible for a voucher. SCS is the only district in Tennessee with that many low-performing schools.
Students would also have to be zoned to or currently attending a school in the bottom 5 percent and would have to meet-age-and-income requirements.
The bill creates a phased-in Opportunity Scholarship Pilot Program that would eventually offer 20,000 students a scholarship to attend private school.
In the 2017-18 school year, the program would cost SCS an estimated $8.8 million in funding, followed by $13.6 million the year after and $18.6 million in 2019-2020. That assumes students claim just 25 percent of each year’s available vouchers.
The program would also cost the state a one-time expense of $330,094 in 2017-18 and a recurring expense of $230,394 in administrative costs per year. Vouchers would be worth just over $7,000 and would increase slightly each year.
Kelsey said Monday the funding loss for SCS would be proportional to the number of students the district would no longer have to educate. The bill also only diverts state money, and requires students using a voucher to be counted toward the enrollment of their local school district. That means the district still retains local funds for them.
“The beauty is they no longer have to educate the child, and yet they’re still getting paid some money,” Kelsey said.
What Kelsey fails to acknowledge is that the public schools that lose students would have to increase class sizes, would have to cut back on arts programs and other parts of the curriculum, but still must pay the cost of buildings and grounds, heating and cooling, and other locked-in expenses. If 10% of the students leave, the schools can’t pay 10% less for electricity.
Does Kelsey know that no voucher program in the U.S. has shown significant benefits to students? Does he care?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Local parent Anne-Marie Farmer has an excellent piece on pending voucher legislation.
http://tnedreport.com/2017/02/farmer-takes-on-vouchers/
I feel like the marketing around vouchers in ed reform is deceptive. They say “how can people who send their children to pricey private schools deny others the chance?”
But that’s not true at all. The voucher doesn’t cover pricey private schools. Seems blatantly deceptive and bad faith to me. It’s such a lousy comparison. They’re offering a small subset of low cost private schools and even there they often aren’t covering the real cost.
It’s like comparing food stamps to a fancy restaurant. It just doesn’t apply.
The voucher won’t pay the cost of elite private schools.
There are no empty seats in elite private schools.
The elite private schools don’t want the poor children of color from the inner city, with or without a voucher. They will take a few, for the sake of diversity, but only if they test in.
That was Obama’s ticket to success. Then, once he had power, he did everything he could to undermine the public schools he never attended, and he never bothered to question his horrible decision.
“Matt Barnum@matt_barnum 35m35 minutes ago
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In Ohio, Figlio estimated that net impact of the voucher program was positive (on test scores) b/c of gains from competition.”
Ed reformers admit vouchers in Ohio didn’t benefit the children who took the voucher.
Instead they say vouchers benefited PUBLIC schools because (supposedly!) the slackers in public schools pulled up their socks and started working for the first time because they had this sword of vouchers over their head.
But why assume that? Isn’t it just as likely public schools got better all on their own volition, with no help at all from ed reform? Why assume public schools are this wholly passive entity doing nothing, just waiting around (as DeVos) says for the Best and Brightest to provide them with negative incentives?
If the voucher research had been different and private schools were better than public schools would ed reformers say “well, obviously, that’s because public schools provided competitive pressure!”
I feel like the anti-public school posture of ed reform is baked in. It colors everything they do. They start with “public schools suck” and everything follows from there.
“Betsy DeVos: ‘Education Establishment’ Has Blocked Efforts to Fix Schools”
Delightful. Pass the buck. From the people who spend all day strutting around crowing about “accountability”.
I know DeVos has to offer some explanation for why her 30 years of work attacking public schools in Michigan has not actually improved public schools in Michigan, but this excuse isn’t gonna fly forever.
Ed reform utterly own Congress, the President and the state legislature and governor in both Ohio and Michigan. This insistence that they are somehow storming the gates against The Establishment is nonsense. They are The Establishment. Public schools are not even consulted on half this stuff. Public school superintendents in Ohio have to travel to the statehouse and hold signs outside to get an audience with our esteemed lawmakers. Meanwhile,every ed reform lobbyist in the country is drafting state law inside the chamber.
It’s even worse in DC. They’re hopeless. They don’t even HIRE public school graduates.
Question: Would these families opt out of the public school to attend these “Christian” private schools? I could see going to a highly rated Parochial School (we have several in my area) but not necessarily one of theses minor schools. Also, if poverty is an issue, how do they get there? Does the district have to provide transportation?
These “geniuses” who come with the ideas never seem to think of the repercussions of their actions. When you throw a pebble into the water sometimes it plops, but there is always some type of ripple effect.
And who buys the uniforms?
And do they provide any services to those with special needs?
Uh, I missed this post. Thanks, Diane. The update is
In their first discussion of tuition vouchers this year, Tennessee lawmakers insisted Tuesday that the state can succeed where others have failed, and easily advanced a proposal that would start a five-year pilot program in Memphis.
The voice vote came after members of a House education subcommittee heard voucher opponents cite recent research showing that vouchers in other states have led to worse academic outcomes for students. But again and again, lawmakers said that Tennessee could be different.
“There are some instances where vouchers haven’t worked, but we’ve never tested them in Tennessee,” said Rep. Harry Brooks, the Knoxville Republican sponsoring the bill.
“We are Tennessee,” added Rep. Eddie Smith, another Knoxville Republican. “We are not Louisiana, we are not Florida, we are not anyone else. We can design a system that works for Tennessee.”
Rep. John DeBerry, a Memphis Democrat who has passionately advocated for vouchers, was dismissive of the studies. “Please, let’s not throw big-picture numbers around,” he said. “This is about one set of parents deciding about one student.”
http://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/tn/2017/03/07/research-suggests-vouchers-havent-worked-in-other-states-tennessee-lawmakers-say-theirs-can-be-different/