The debate over the use of school vouchers continues to cause disagreements among educators and parents across the country. Are these vouchers part of the solution to the problems of the public school system? Or are they another impediment for change?
In Ohio, the state legislature has created a $5.5 million school voucher pilot program in the city of Cleveland. The program provides $2500 vouchers to about 2,000 students attending kindergarten through the third grade.
There are about 53 private schools involved in the program. These schools have agreed to accept the students using these vouchers paid for by state tax revenue. The state pilot program also includes both religious bases schools along with other private schools.
The school voucher idea is controversial. Those who support it, see it as providing those parents participating a choice in where to send their children to be educated. They also believe that school voucher programs force the public school system, where these students would normally go, to improve because of the competition.
Opponents call school vouchers a bad idea created to shift focus from the real problems of education. They believe any use of tax money to send children to private schools removes significant financial and other resources away from the fight for the real solutions. Structural and societal concerns, like poverty, are pointed to as real impediments to improved education.
On June 10th, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin upheld the constitutionality, at both state and federal levels, of the nation's oldest government-funded scholarship program for low-income families. The Milwaukee program's expansion to include religious schools and to admit more families had been challenged in court by public school teachers' unions and national organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union. An appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court is expected.
The debate is one of the hottest in education because it involves money, religion and taking students out of public schools. Vouchers would use tax dollars to pay the tuition for students at private schools. In many cases this would include religious schools.
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