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Chapter 16 | Social Policy

School Vouchers

One of the most controversial areas of education policy over

the past 20 years has been school vouchers—the practice of

providing taxpayers’ money directly to families to allow them

to send their children to private schools rather than public

schools. The vouchers are similar to a scholarship and are

used in 13 states, including Wisconsin, which implemented

the first voucher program in 1999 in Milwaukee, and Indiana,

which implemented the first statewide program in 2011.a

Vouchers establish needed competition between

public and private schools. Supporters of the program

say that it introduces competition into public education, which

suffers from the inefficiencies that are typical of monopolies.

They argue that many urban school systems have failed

to educate their children and that poor minority students

deserve a better education than the one they get in public

schools. They say that students who are given the opportunity

to leave public schools often improve their academic

performance in private schools. Secretary of Education Betsy

DeVos recently pushed a proposal that would provide private

school vouchers for military families instead of the “impact

aid” for public schools that the federal government has always

provided for public schools by military bases.

Supporters of school vouchers are an unusual alliance

between free market conservatives, who are typically

Republicans, and inner-city minorities, who normally are

strong Democrats. The former believe that school systems

can benefit from introducing competitive market forces, and

the latter are desperate for anything that will rescue their

children from failing public schools. These supporters of

vouchers are opposed by teachers’ unions, most Democratic

politicians, and those who favor strengthening the public

schools by investing more money in them and trying new

approaches, such as public magnet schools, charter schools,

and public school choice.

Vouchers undermine an already challenged public

school system. Opponents say that private schools

engage in “cherry picking,” choosing the more motivated

students and leaving the more difficult to educate in the

public school classrooms, contributing to a downward

spiral in these institutions. Opponents also argue that

standardized test scores do not improve for students

who participate in voucher programs. Finally, they claim

that voucher programs are an unconstitutional violation

of the separation between church and state because an

overwhelming proportion of the students in these programs

attend Catholic parochial schools.

Evidence on voucher opponents’ first two points is

mixed, but the bulk of the evidence supports their views.

The most studied voucher program is the Milwaukee

program mentioned earlier. In the most systematic analysis

of that program, John F. Witte, political scientist and

expert on education policy, argues that vouchers should be

evaluated on a basic question of values, the clash between

freedom of choice and equality of opportunity, rather than

specific programmatic outcomes, because the effects are

small to nonexistent.b

The Supreme Court has upheld voucher programs

while asserting that they did not violate the separation of

church and state. However, in a case upholding Cleveland’s

voucher program the Court did not give vouchers a green

light beyond the narrow facts of the case. Indeed, that 5–4

decision required a voucher program to, among other things,

• be a part of a much wider program of multiple educational
  options, such as magnet schools and after-school tutorial
  assistance;


• offer parents a real choice between religious and nonre-
  ligious education, perhaps even providing incentives for
  nonreligious education; and


• not only address private schools but also ensure that ben-
  efits go to schools regardless of whether they are public
  or private, religious or not.c
  Meanwhile, the state supreme courts in Arizona and
  Colorado struck down school voucher programs as a
  violation of the separation of church and state, but a similar
  program was upheld in Alabama.

take a stand

1. What do you see as the advantages and disadvantages
   of providing vouchers to allow students to attend any
   school they want?


2. Should these programs be expanded, or would they
   undermine the quality of public schools?

Most school vouchers go to private Catholic schools, like the

one shown here.

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