At a glance

THE ISSUE: The state legislature recently expanded the private school voucher program, making almost all Hoosier families eligible to receive money to offset the cost for their children to attend private K-12 schools. Funding that would have gone to local public schools will follow them.

OUR VIEW: The voucher expansion further erodes the separation of church and state, and it will drain resources from public schools.
School choice is one thing. A state-sponsored program that enables nearly every K-12 student in Indiana to attend a private school on the backs of taxpayers is another thing altogether.

But that’s precisely where we are with the state legislature’s recent expansion of Indiana’s private school voucher program.

Beginning next school year, families earning up to 400% of the maximum level to qualify for free and reduced-price lunches will be able to send their children to a private school on the public’s dime.

That’s a 33% increase in the maximum income level, not to mention the elimination of eligibility restrictions for participating students.

FOR EVERY student taking advantage of the program, about $6,000 in state funding that would have gone to the local public school will now follow the student to a private school.

So, other than the fact that taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars are transferred from public schools to private schools, what’s the problem with this expanded voucher program?

HERE ARE several that leap to mind:

• Proponents of school choice argue that families sending their children to private schools are taxpayers, too. Well, sure they are, but other taxpayers will foot the vast majority of the bill.

• You remember something called separation of church and state? It’s a foundational tenet of American government. The voucher program makes a mockery of it, using tax money to support private schools, including many that have a core mission of promoting a specific set of religious beliefs.

• With the voucher expansion, a Hoosier family of four with an annual income of up to $220,000 will qualify. That means the program offers financial assistance — originally intended for people at or near the poverty level to attend a private school — to nearly all Hoosier families, including many who could easily afford most private schools.

• The voucher program siphons off both students and funding, thereby simultaneously weakening public schools while creating a shadow public school system that is not held to the same standards.

• Though the state is relatively flush with funds for the voucher program, it might not be prepared in the long run now that an estimated 96.5% of all school-aged Hoosier children come from voucher-eligible families. State projections indicate voucher participation could grow by nearly 42,000 students within the next two years.

• Analysts believe the vast majority of families that will take advantage initially of the voucher expansion already send their kids to private schools, meaning that the expansion will simply transfer responsibility for paying the cost of the tuition from those families to taxpayers.

• The state will devote about $500 million to the voucher expansion over the next two years. Just think of the good that money could do for public schools.

While giving struggling families a choice in where their children go to school might be an admirable goal, the state’s voucher expansion goes well beyond that, undermining public education and further eroding the wall between church and state.
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