The voucher movement should be dead, in light of the numerous evaluations showing that voucher schools do not get better results than public schoools, and in many evaluations, voucher students lose ground compared to their peers in public schools.
The GOP is determined to siphon public dollars away from public schools and send them to religious schools.
Missouri Governor Parson just signed a voucher bill that will allow students to attend low-cost private and religious school while reducing the state’s revenues and reducing funding for public schools.
This is choice for the sake of choice, not for the benefit of students. This is the Betsy DeVos model.
The Associated Press reports:
Missouri students as soon as next year could have access to scholarships for private school through a new tax credit program signed Wednesday by Gov. Mike Parson.
Under the voucher-style program, private donors would give money to nonprofits that in turn would dole out the scholarships. The money could be used for private school tuition, transportation to school, extra tutoring and other education-related expenses.
Donors to the program would get state tax credits equal to the amount they give, an indirect way to divert state tax dollars to private education.
Parson’s signature represents a long-sought victory for primarily GOP advocates of so-called school choice legislation, which has struggled to gain traction with Missouri Republicans in rural areas where public schools likely would be students’ only option regardless of changes in state law.
“This legislation will empower students and parents with access to resources and educational opportunities that best meet the individual needs of their child,” Sen. Andrew Koenig, a suburban St. Louis Republican, said in a statement.
Critics of school voucher programs have said they funnel money away from public schools by drawing students out of those districts, leading to a drop in attendance and a subsequent drop in funding.
“Missouri is 49th in the country in average starting teachers’ salaries,” Melissa Randol, who heads the Missouri School Boards’ Association, said in a statement. “We need to invest in Missouri’s high quality teachers, rather than funnel money to institutions that have no accountability to taxpayers for how they spend taxpayers’ dollars or how they educate our children.”
Only K-12 students in the state’s largest cities — those with at least 30,000 residents — would be able to get the scholarships. That includes St. Louis, Kansas City and many of their suburbs. It also covers Springfield, Columbia, Cape Girardeau, Jefferson City, Joplin and St. Joseph.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
The purpose of vouchers is to create a circular conduit of dollars from taxpayers to privateers to politicians’ campaign coffers and any other diversions to their personal bank accounts they can hide from public accountability. It’s a Cycle of Crime and everyone in the money laundromat gains at the expense of taxpayers and public schools.
Yes. There’s another purpose as well. The smarter Repugnicans (I know, I know, but bear with me) know that they’ve lost young people. On every issue, poll the people under 25, and they oppose the standard Repugnican position. So, a lot of them recognize that they could become extinct over time and want to transfer dollars to private Christian fundamentalist madrasas where the next generation of kids might be effectively indoctrinated. Yes, Cain and Abel rode around on dinosaurs; yes, global warming is a hoax perpetrated by China; yes, Trump won the election; yes, we know this because he was appointed by Jesus to drain the swamp.
Really Bob?
When at least two state Catholic Conference executive directors take credit for the school choice legislation in their states… when the conservative Catholic majority on SCOTUS delivered in 2020, the two wins that primarily benefit their churches- (Biel and Espinosa cases)…?
Is teaching that Cain and Able rode on dinosaurs worse than the priest pedophilia and its cover-up and, is it worse than what happened to First Nation children at Catholic-run boarding schools in Canada?
Is a historically inaccurate timing sequence worse than the campaign by Catholic and evangelical leaders described in, “The new official contents …education … : laicism in the crosshairs”, at the Scielo site?
Is it worse than a church that overtly discriminates against women and says it’s God’s will? Is it worse than discrimination against gay people?
Yes, Catholic leaders have supported such legislation as well. But I made not claim to the contrary. I merely described “another [that was my word] reason” why we have seen such a Republican push for vouchers.
to keep the laundry theme going: the spin cycle
Jon,
In states like Ohio, the overwhelming amount of voucher dollars go to
Catholic schools. Btw, the U.S. pledge of allegiance recited by students in some schools like Covington Catholic which is the alma mater of Nick Sandmann, represented by Lin Wood in his suit against media, has been altered to include Catholic doctrine.
I grant you that it’s popular to note with disdain voucher money that goes to evangelical schools. I surmise it’s because the Catholic church’s overt discrimination against women is no biggee as long as students are taught a scientific version of evolution.
Parents, come on down to Enlightened Master Bob’s Ayahuasca Academy for Little Cosmic Voyagers and spend your voucher!
LOVE your article, Bob. 👍🏽👍🏽👍🏽
GOOD GAWD… those rePUG-ni-CONS only know how to destroy. 🤮
A few years back, the genius Repugnican legislators of the state of Flor-uh-duh passed legislation ensuring that Christians would be able to maintain their creches at Christmastime within the Capitol Rotunda. Then, of course, groups like The Church of Satan sued in court for their right under this law to their own Capitol display and won. So, now, in the Flor-uh-duh Capitol, at Christmastime, one finds a Church of Satan display of an angel falling into flames.
From The Tallahassee Democrat newspaper:
A 6-foot pole of beer cans celebrating the fictitious holiday Festivus has made its way into the Capitol for the past two years as have several banners from atheist groups and a display from the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
As these voucher programs proliferate, expect schools based on such nonsense. Under the principle of equal treatment under the law, they would be allowable under these voucher bills.
Hang onto your colander hats as we watch the emergence of hese
Unintended Consequences.
Bob Shepherd
Church of the flying spaghetti monster sounds like a fine institution.
Festivus is a parody of commercialism during the Christmas season. It was started by an episode of Seinfeld. People put an undecorated aluminum pole in their home and have an airing out of grievances during a big dinner of meatloaf. The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster follows Pastafarianism and opposes teaching creationism in public schools. It was started by a physics graduate of Oregon State when he wrote an open letter to the Kansas Board of Education mocking biblical literalists by claiming the universe had really been created when the pasta monster got drunk one day. It’s all in the Spaghetti gospel, The Loose Canon. Heaven has a beer volcano. They celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day. That’s what I call using your noodle.
The point both “religions” make is that you don’t have to stray too far from mainstream religion to find some pretty strange, illogical rituals that make separation of church and state look really good.
“Private donors would give money to nonprofits that in turn would dole out the scholarships. The money could be used for private school tuition, transportation to school, extra tutoring and other education-related expenses. Donors to the program would get state tax credits equal to the amount they give, an indirect way to divert state tax dollars to private education.”
So if I own a school, a school bus, a tutoring service, or any other education-related business, I can donate money to people who will spend the money on my business, and I get a tax credit equal to the amount I donated to myself. Basically, I give you a dollar bill that you have to give right back to me, and Missouri will give me a tax credit on the dollar I essentially gave to myself. And since I gave you/me the dollar through a nonprofit organization, you don’t even have to use the dollar and I still get my tax credit. And public schools lose more than a dollar because of fixed costs, per pupil funding, and all that lost tax revenue.
That is a very efficiently inefficient system. Show me state indeed — show me how to step on a rake. Hey everyone, Missouri will give you money if you punch Missouri in the face.
Show me how to step on a rake!!! LMAO!!!!
Left Coast Teacher. Outstanding
Public money should not be used to support vouchers, and public money should not support religious schools that discriminate against students of color. By giving the wealthy tax credits for their “donations,” a greater percentage of taxes will be the burden of the working class, or services will be cut. This plan is a loss for working families while the wealthy get to reduce their tax responsibilities.
It’s a bad news kind of day. This on top of the racist ruling halting DACA. #@&*&#&$!!!!
This is an accident waiting to happen. We can only hope.
The proverbial devil is in the details but the devil will control the details. Hopefully monitoring and Constitutional tests will prevail.
Tax credits for donors whose contributions go to “education assistance organizations” to allocate multi-use scholarships to “certain” student to use for “certain” purposes” with “certain” guidelines. What could go wrong? How soon before these “EAOs” show up in NPE’s list of HUNDREDS OF CHARTER SCANDALS?
How soon will we see these MO EAOs in yet another headline with the words “Cautionary Tale?”
So in what was once the “Show Me” state but now the “Only About Me” state with a right-wing Republican stranglehold on who decides which “me” benefits… now another law.
The law?
There is no mention of race, gender, or religion in the law* (note the ABSENCE OF DISCRIMNATION BASED ON GENDER ORIENTATION which is NOT PROTECTED IN MO). Is this legislated segregation in private and parochial schools where diversity is already questionable and will essentially legislated white flight from cities where SEGEGRATION IN MO. CHARTER SCHOOLS IS SKYROCKETING! Will this allow / follow suit?
Are the tax credits not then indirect tax-support of religious schools?
While citing benefits to children with disabilities, will this play out SIMILAR TO CHARTER SCHOOLS UNWRITTEN MEANS but “word on the street” means of not accepting “costly low incidence disabilities need not apply” because the receiving schools will not be able to fund the balance of services required? (All this provides is the tuition voucher to get you in the place which won’t even cover tuition in private schools, only parochial).
Will learning enter the conversation? The law states achievement and a few other indicators must be collected and reported (three years later). Whether using the state tests or others (which will reveal nothing), will reporting continue to sell the Legislature and corporate folks a bill of goods similar to what currently is done with MO CHARTER SCHOOLS MISRPESENTATION OF DATA.
The state currently funded an “education organization” non-profit (a.k.a. lobbyist for Charter Schools) with close to $2 million to sit in the bank right next to City Fund and other dark money contributions. Hmm. Will they be eligible to be an EAO?
The GOP was invaded successfully by ALEC. That means the Republicans do not represent the working class anymore. They are now toadies for billionaires like Charles Koch, Bill Gates, Betsy the Beast DeVos, and fake billionaires like Traitor Trump.
ALEC’s influence in the Democratic party is sketchy.
ALEC is the GOP’s god.
If ALEC had not existed, the GOP would have had to create it.
ALEC was co-founded by the same person, Paul Weyrich, who co-founded the religious right and the Koch’s Heritage Foundation. He was not a protestant evangelical as many erroneously assume. An argument could be made that his religion is irrelevant if his religious beliefs hadn’t driven his vision for political control of the U.S. and, if it hadn’t influenced his view of concepts like common goods. The extent to which the religious leaders of his church continue to hold sway in D.C. and state capitols and the extent to which judicial appointees follow the same religious tenets means that his religion should not be selectively ignored, as much as people seem to want to do so.
Average Joe practicing his religion at his church on Maple Street is irrelevant to the preceding.
So well said, Lloyd, Jon!
Uh, Lloyd, Jon, and Voltaire
The Republicans represented the working class ? When would that have been?
Not 1948 when 2/1 Republicans were joined by Dixie-crats to override Truman’s veto of Taft Hartley.
Teddy Roosevelt. That was the last time.
1908.
Mike Allen at Axios recently bemoaned the “liberal” bent of the Ivy Leagues, criticizing them for having the influence that turns national policy to the left. The mischaracterization is media’s false flag to protect the rich.
Media ignores Georgetown, Notre Dame and the very Koch-friendly Catholic University of America. It’s as if the religious right’s vehicle, the Council on National Policy has no influence
If I understand the legislation correctly, the maximum amount of assistance is $6375, according to coverage in the news organization “The Missouri Independent” [June 2,2021 by Tessa Weinberg]. This will not be enough help for poor families who want to send a child to one of the private schools for students with disabilities. These private schools cost much more than $6 K a year. If such voucher programs are going to exist, it would be interesting to see one that can actually enable a poor student to access these private schools for students with disabilities. These small private schools sometimes have low student: teacher ratios.
$6,000 works in the Parochial schools. One black legislator voted in favor of the vouchers because of the number of Archdiocese schools in his district. Tuition in private schools is well into the $10,000 and above range, but if the $6,000 can help reduce that scholarship amount, the schools can allocate more scholarships.
As noted above, however, there is no indication on race or gender so these scholarships will potentially support white flight or “creaming” of black students (the “best and brightest recruited)
The Bait and Switch (popular appliance ad in St. Louis) aspect of this is drawing parents of students with disabilities into supporter role and they will soon find out their child whose IEPs are very expensive to administer will not get served.