Writing for Houston Press, April Lowery takes a look at the Texas school choice program and finds that it might just be “welfare for the wealthy.”
Houston American Federation of Teachers president Jackie Anderson is worried that a new taxpayer-funded voucher program could dismantle public education.
Last year, Republican lawmakers led by Gov. Greg Abbott championed “Education Freedom Accounts,” a $1 billion school choice program advertised as a taxpayer-funded mechanism to give poor kids and students with disabilities an opportunity to learn in a private setting.
Who doesn’t like freedom and choice? But it’s nothing but a grift, says Anderson, who retired from teaching in public classrooms after a 33-year career.
“The money that is being used for the vouchers is pulling dollars directly from our public schools and making it available to private schools, mostly for parents who can already afford to pay for their students to be in private schools,” she says. “This is why we said it’s welfare for the wealthy. It’s a big grift. It’s a way to destroy public education.”
More than 274,000 voucher applications were filed by the March 31 deadline, and there’s not enough money in the pot to go around. Only about 90,000 to 100,000 vouchers will be awarded, based on the funds available.
The comptroller’s office, which oversees the program, says priority will be given to low-income families and students with disabilities, but the number of people who fall into those categories and actually applied is low, and approved private schools can use discretion in who they accept.
An Austin legislative consultant who has worked on the voucher issue and asked to remain anonymous said she’s received reports that some of the voucher-accepting schools are attempting to determine what faith an applicant practices, requiring a letter from a pastor and asking questions about how many parents are in the household in order to vet applicants.
Anderson says that’s discriminatory. “I would venture to say, and I don’t have the statistics, that a private school would not take a child with any severe disabilities, as public schools must do, because they know they cannot provide the care that these students need,” she says.
Using vouchers to fund discrimination is a familiar pattern. Read the full article here.