
Max Pixel
Cellular Education Classroom
School vouchers allow families to pay for private school education with public money. They were originally created as a way for parents to avoid sending their children to desegregated schools during the tumultuous years after the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, which declared state laws establishing segregated schools unconstitutional.
Today, school vouchers continue to undermine desegregation. Unlike public education, vouchers have no accountability framework or public oversight. And they are part of the larger conservative effort to dismantle teachers’ unions and destroy the public school system entirely.
These programs take tax dollars out of state and federal coffers and divert them into private hands by way of private schools, including religious schools. They are sold as a promise to help disadvantaged and minority students, but what vouchers really do is turn educating students into a commodities market for profit-seekers.
School vouchers now come in many forms, some with novel-sounding names that attempt to obscure their purpose. But all of them work to maintain socially and economically stratified schools in the United States.
Here’s a guide to decoding terms you may encounter that are really vouchers in disguise:
“Scholarships” and Tuition Grants
Like vouchers, “scholarships” or tuition grants are ways for states to directly reimburse private schools for tuition costs.
Like vouchers, scholarships and tuition grants are a reaction to the federal mandate to desegregate schools. States offered to pay for white students to attend inexpensive private schools, called “segregation academies” in the early 60’s, and therefore avoid white students attending schools with African Americans.
Vouchers, scholarships, and tuition grants are touted as a way to help poor students attend private schools, but they usually provide less money than the full tuition, leaving many low income families unable to use the assistance.
Education Savings Accounts, Empowerment Scholarship Accounts and Universal Savings Accounts
Funds are directly deposited into Education Savings Accounts (commonly known as ESAs) for individual students and can be used for homeschooling, a private school or an online “school.” No academic goals or requirements are demanded of these programs. The money that would be spent to maintain public schools is then diverted to unregulated private enterprises.
Nevada, Arizona, Florida, Tennessee and Mississippi have signed onto an ALEC bill titled the Education Savings Account Act. Education Savings Accounts are sometimes referred to by states as Universal Savings Accounts. In Nevada, legal challenges stopped funding for Education Savings Accounts for now.
Not to be deterred by public sentiment and pesky laws, the agenda for the ALEC conference held in July this year included discussion on the Education Savings Account Act and the Great Schools Tax Credit Program Act.
“Neovouchers”: Tax Credits, Tuition Tax Credits and Scholarship Tax Credits
Neovouchers are a new, indirect way to funnel public funds to private enterprises.
As I’ve written previously, Scholarship Tax Credit programs allow money to bypass the state and instead route through a third-party “scholarship granting organization.” These organizations pay part or full tuitions for students at private schools, usually keeping a ten percent cut. They have free range to select which schools they do business with, whether these are religious or even unaccredited schools. Scholarship granting organizations claim that they help low income students attend the private schools in their portfolio.
Since the inception of these new forms of segregation—touted as a way to help the poor and minorities—proponents of vouchers have profited greatly. The altruistic mask is off now as more entrepreneurs seize upon what they consider a cash cow, our public schools.
Recommended Reading:
“The Racist Origins of Private School Vouchers,” Center for American Progress
“Milton Friedman, Betsy DeVos, and the Privatization of Public Education,” Dissent Magazine
“ALEC Admits School Vouchers Are for Kids in Suburbia,” The Center for Media and Democracy’s PR Watch
“A Failed Experiment: Georgia’s Tax Credit Scholarships for Private Schools,” The Southern Education Foundation