North Carolina Advocates Urge Stein to Reject Federal School Voucher Scheme
Trump's voucher plan is bad news
States around the country are deciding whether or not to participate in Donald Trump’s public school destruction scheme, otherwise known as federal school vouchers.
Like other voucher programs, Trump’s scheme will exacerbate inequality. It’s a double gift to the very wealthy: Tax breaks for those who contribute to school voucher organizations and school vouchers, which effectively act as private school discount coupons for wealthy families.
North Carolina has not yet decided what it will do.
Public education advocates, including the North Carolina Justice Center, are encouraging Gov. Stein to reject the Trumpian scheme.
Our analysis shows the vast majority of federal voucher funding is awarded to disproportionately wealthy families who have already enrolled their children in private schools. In North Carolina’s largest voucher program, 85 percent of new funding has gone to such families, worsening the divides between wealthy and working-class North Carolinians.
And, vouchers simply don’t help improve academic outcomes:
For families swapping their public school for a private one, the state will have to manage the costs of those children receiving a subpar education. Studies of voucher programs in Washington, DC Indiana, Louisiana, and Ohio found that voucher students perform far worse academically than their peers who remain in traditional, inclusive local public schools. Many of these poorly served students return to the public school system where they then require additional resources to compensate for the inferior education they received in private school.
So, the advocates have this suggestion:
By unambiguously rejecting the federal voucher program now, Stein can shift the education debate back to where it belongs: securing full funding for the constitutionally mandated Leandro Plan. The tutoring and after school programs that Stein wants would become readily affordable if schools finally receive the 40 percent state funding increase mandated by the Supreme Court.