This is the third in our series, Private School Vouchers: Analysis of 2019 State Legislative Sessions. Read the
first and
second parts.
In 2017, the Arizona Legislature passed, and the Republican Governor, Doug Ducey, signed, a bill expanding the state’s existing Education Savings Account (ESA) voucher program. The legislation created one of the most expansive voucher programs in the nation, opening the existing ESA voucher, first established in 2011, to all students statewide. The
program had been limited to students with disabilities, several Native American Tribes, and students in “low-performing” public schools.
Shortly after the bill’s passage, public school advocates collected more than 111,000 signatures to put an initiative on the ballot to overturn the ESA voucher expansion. In November 2018,
Arizonans voted against the voucher expansionby an overwhelming margin: 65% to 35%. Following the vote,
Beth Lewis, co-founder of Save our Schools Arizona, the grassroots group that led the effort to collect signatures, said, ”This result sends a message to the state and the nation that Arizona supports public education, not privatization schemes that hurt our children and our communities.”
However, just a few months after the public referendum, during the 2019 legislative session, Republican lawmakers
introduced a number of bills to again expand the ESA voucher program. These bills would have added new student eligibility categories, including families below a certain income threshold and students who are victims of crimes or harassment. Two of these bills passed the relevant committees but were not considered by the full House or Senate. The remaining bills were not taken up at all.
While the proposed private school voucher bills did not pass in 2019, Arizona demonstrates that public school supporters can never assume their work is done, even when the public has resoundingly spoken against privatization. A day after the defeat of the expanded voucher program at the ballot box, voucher advocates publicly redoubled their efforts to expand the ESA program.
In Texas, where a Democrat has not been elected statewide since 1994, every bill introduced in the Legislature to establish a private school voucher program has
failed to become law. As in several other conservative states, a bipartisan coalition of Democrats and rural Republican legislators in Texas has consistently opposed these bills. However, unlike many of these other states, more suburban Republican legislators are joining the opposition to vouchers, preferring to focus on funding for public schools.
In the 2018 election, Democrats picked up a number of seats in the suburbs of the state’s large cities, including those previously held by several strong voucher proponents. Additionally, during primary elections, several pro-voucher legislators lost to candidates who were more supportive of public education. As the head of the Texas American Federation of Teachers,
Louis Malfaro, said, “….almost categorically the Republicans who ran as friends of public education prevailed over those who said we need more school choice, we need more vouchers, so I don’t see appetite on either side of the aisle.”
During the 2019 legislative session, Republican leaders, including the governor, notably did not include private school vouchers among their education priorities. Perhaps in response to electoral losses in the suburbs and a lack of support for vouchers, legislative leaders emphasized
improving the state’s public school financing system instead.
Acknowledgements
Many thanks to Jason Unger for compiling the research and drafting this series on 2019 legislative sessions.
Press Contact:
Sharon Krengel
Policy and Outreach Director
Education Law Center
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Diane Ravitch's blog 
Having spent all of last year working exclusively on expanding vouchers, ed reformers in Ohio will now spend 2020 fixing the mess they made:
https://www.daytondailynews.com/news/private-school-voucher-program-nearly-double-some-suburbs-affected/c3PjW84qCy6rjmryeICx8I
If you’re one of the 90% of students and families who attend public schools in this state you should ask your state legislator and the governor what they accomplished for PUBLIC school students in 2019- the answer is “nothing”.
90% of the kids in this state attend public schools, yet 90% of what gets done in Columbus is promoting private and charter schools. They return zero value to public school students and families and in many cases (as here) they actually harm our students. It’s utter and complete capture by charter and voucher lobbyists. No one lifts a finger on behalf of public schools or public school students. Year after year after year it’s all charters and vouchers, all day everyday.
We should think about hiring some state employees who have some interest in the 90% of students who attend the unfashionable public sector schools, rather than hiring and paying people who spend all day promoting their ideological mission to privatize. The public should demand it. 90% of students shouldn’t come second to ed reform’s political goals.
The most telling thing about the ed reform lobby who run my state legislature is how they don’t even pretend to offer anything to public school students.
Here’s Fordham defending the massive increase in vouchers by arguing it won’t harm public school students too much:
“First, it’s highly unlikely that the EdChoice designated school list is going to lead to a mass exodus of public school students. Just because students are eligible for a voucher doesn’t mean they’re going to actually use one. Parents aren’t going to pull their students out of schools that they feel are serving them well. For example, an elementary school in Shaker Heights found itself on the list last year for the first time but only lost a total of five students. In places like Solon, Shaker Heights, and Upper Arlington, where housing prices are high, the likelihood of a significant number of families suddenly opting for private schools is slim. Many of these residents pay high mortgages and property taxes because they want to send their children to the local public schools.”
Why are we paying state employees not to harm our schools and students too much? Aren’t they supposed to actually contribute some benefit to 90% of students in the state?
Why is the standard for ed reform “success” so ridiculously low that “not destroying public schools” is now a reason to hire and pay thousands of people?
Do public school students in this state deserve actual advocates, or shall we stick with the charter and voucher crowd, who measure their success by whether or not they actively harm public school students? That is a ludicrously low standard.
We can identify, as if it’s in a vacuum, what Ohio decision makers are doing. We can take the next step and identify the intent- to build a theocracy.
Seven mountains theology- take control of the seven major spheres of society – religion, family, education, government, media, arts and entertainment.
most essential question: why do we PAY people who do such harm to our schools
Because citizen protests are met with indifference by ALEC representatives and senators?
Despite having rejected vouchers at the polls and a state constitution the prohibits public funds to religious schools, Florida is the land of vouchers. Using the con artist trickery Florida is known for, the state has circumvented the law through tax credit “scholarships.” The early “scholarships” were reserved for low income families. Having managed to snooker the public before on this issue, DeSantis has expanded the vouchers called “Family Empowerment Scholarships” to those earning up to $80,000.
There will be a huge voucher scandal. They’re not regulating this massive expansion at all.
Guaranteed.
You just can’t write huge checks to hundreds of unregulated vendors and that’s what they’re doing all over the country. It is as predictable as the sunrise. Have you seen some of the Florida voucher schools that are now 100% publicly funded? Calling them “schools” is a stretch.
No regulation is only the first problem. There’s no real reporting either. They’ll be lucky if it’s a financial scandal, because it’s equally as likely to be a student safety scandal.
This is a 100% ideological experiment with billions in public funds. Even Barry Goldwater never dreamed they’d hand out billions in public funds to anyone who applies. A predictable disaster and all of ed reform are working as hard as they can to expand these programs everywhere. The exposure to risk grows greater with each one of their voucher victories. No one looks critically at any of the programs, no one in the echo chamber questions any of it- there’s no analysis at all- just ideological cheerleading.
“More vouchers! Quicker!” It’s exactly what they did when they were all cheerleading every charter school that opened.
It’s a shame but this is what happens when you create an echo chamber, and they have done that. There’s no dissent or criticism in this “movement” at all- if it’s labeled “charter” or “voucher” they all promote it. I understand it from the lobbyists and political operatives, but aren’t the academics among them embarrassed?
Do ed reformers in state and federal government have an idea when they might get around to working on something that actually benefits public school students?
Or are we supposed to pay them for another 20 years with no returned value going to 90% of students and families?
Can they list what they’ve accomplished as far as public schools in 2019? We’re paying thousands of them- one would think we’d have something to show for it.
Talk about low expectations. Charters, vouchers, charters, vouchers. Year after year after year. No one even expects them to offer public school families anything- they don’t even pretend to.
Here’s what public school students get out of the ed reform ideological project- they get endless testing and measurement schemes and a grim, joyless agenda and reduced funding. For this we’re all supposed to vote for them and hire them. It’s a bad deal for public school students and public school families, not to mention taxpayers who are now in the position of paying people who OPPOSE public education to work on public education.
It’s ludicrous and it’s an example of how cloistered the echo chamber is that it’s perfectly acceptable in ed reform. For this they give each other awards.
“A Theocratic Movement Hiding in Plain Sight”, by Frederic Clarkson, at Political Research Associates- the article mentions homeschooling, maximum latitude in accreditation for Christian schools, and decentralized government.
One of the prominent figures in the movement, Francis Schaffer, advocated for “co-belligerancy…strategic partnerships”. In 2009, the Manhattan Declaration brought the USCCB, the evangelical Christian Right and allied politicians in the Republican Party together for “life, marriage and religious liberty”.
The politicians identified in the article all have links to the Koch’s, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (Texas), Gov. Brownback (KS), Sen. James Lankford (OK), Rep. Steve King (IA), Michelle Bachman, Rick Perry and Ted Cruz.
American theocracy schemes to hold cultural authority and privilege.
For obvious reasons they are at loggerheads with a democracy supported by public schools. Dismissing their success as ludicrous, vitiates the power to stop it.
Fordham and the Koch-linked Manhattan Institute praised Catholic schools. Fordham funded a paper on self discipline and Catholic schools. At least two Koch-lined groups featured the Fordham written synopsis in stories and, more than 15 Catholic media.