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A major expansion proposed for Indiana’s private school voucher program could become a hurdle as the Republican-dominated Legislature works on a new state budget.
The expansion backed by House Republicans could cost more than $500 million over the next two years—nearly one-third of the total proposed school funding increase—by raising the income limit to qualify for state money toward private school tuition.
Democrats and many public school organizations oppose the expansion as draining money away from traditional public schools that educate about 90% of the state’s students. But the question will be whether Senate Republicans will go along with the proposal as they work with the House to reach a budget deal by their late April deadline.
Senate President Pro Tempore Rodric Bray said the size of the voucher expansion approved by House Republicans was a key budget consideration.
“They’ve added a lot of money to the K-12 budget, but some of that is whittled down as to what actually goes to our traditional public schools because of the way they structured it,” Bray said Thursday. “So that’s why we’re taking a look at it.”
Republicans around the country have been pushing similar voucher systems for years, with Iowa lawmakers voting in January to join West Virginia and Arizona as states with few eligibility restrictions. At least a dozen states — including Arkansas and Kansas — have been debating similar programs this year.
The Indiana House plan centers on raising the family income limit for the federal free or reduced-price meals program from the current 300% of income eligibility to a 400% limit. That would boost the income limit for a family of four from the current $154,000 to $220,000. It would also continue a major program expansion that Republican lawmakers started in 2021 by raising that family size’s income limit for a full voucher payment from the $48,000 cap previously in place.
Estimates from the non-partisan Legislative Services Agency project that the expansion would result in the program’s cost growing nearly 250% in a five-year period—from $171 million for the 2020-21 school year to an estimated $595 million in 2024-25.
Republican House Speaker Todd Huston has been a firm supporter of eventually lifting all income limits for the vouchers and called the program “extraordinarily successful.”
“They’re popular with families and we see no reason why we shouldn’t continue to expand them,” Huston said.
The broader eligibility provisions are projected to grow the voucher program from the current 53,500 students to some 95,000 students in two years. If the number of students reaches that level, that would be almost 170% more than the roughly 35,000 students receiving voucher payments before the 2021 expansion.
A state Department of Education report showed that all the voucher program enrollment growth in the first school year with that expansion was from students who had never attended an Indiana public school. A legislative report projected that if the program’s income limit was eliminated, nearly 90% of all new voucher students would be students who would have attended private schools anyway.
Voucher expansion opponents point to legislative projections that three-quarters of the state’s school districts would see funding increases of less than 2% in the second year of the House spending plan, which they argue would pinch their inflation-stressed budget and hurt efforts to boost Indiana’s lagging teacher pay.
Democratic Sen. Andrea Hunley, a former Indianapolis Public Schools elementary principal, called the voucher expansion a further financial “erosion” by directing one-third of additional state money to private schools with fewer than 10% of the state’s students.
“That leaves just 70% of new money to cover more than 90% of our students in public schools, which already have to fight year after year to secure every dollar possible to keep the lights on (and) to pay our teachers,” Hunley said.
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You have to be really stupid to be against school choice and vouchers.
Until private and charter schools are following the same rules and restrictions as public schools, a person would have to be “stupid” to let tax dollars be basically given away with low-to-no accountability.
I call bs…
…and you have to be really, really stupid to be for them.
Kids can already go to any public school in the state.
Why give away taxpayer dollars to schools that get worse outcomes and aren’t held accountable to those outcomes?
A reminder the state of Indiana lost $86 million to a charter virtual school enrolling dead kids and we still, to the best of my knowledge, haven’t seen a dime of it back yet.
Why are “conservative” Republicans trying to destroy Indiana’s constitutionally mandated system of traditional public schools? Seems more radical than conservative. Bizarre.
Money.
What Pat said. Throw in … it’s an attempt by religious folks to boost their numbers, thinking if they get kids young, maybe they’ll keep them in the pews.
Tell me again why my tax dollars should pay for other people’s children to go to private schools? No state, community or country will compete without a robust public school system. Oh, and isn’t Todd Huston a consultant for Stride and Spokenote? Follow the money indeed.
Because my tax dollars have gone to public schools and I have paid tuition so that my children can receive the education & support I feel was best for their future success
If you want to pay tuition, knock yourself out. People have done that for decades. I did it for several years until I realized my kids were worse off in private religious schools than in public schools.
Why should taxpayers be forced to pay for an education in which kids are taught religious beliefs that some taxpayers may not agree with, but they also get a substandard education that ends up harming everyone when they aren’t contributing members of society?
We’ve already just said parents have no right to allow their transgendered kids to take medicines. So it appears to me that the parental rights are now secondary to the desires of the government … except when it comes to voucher dollars.
Why should my tax dollars go to educate your children in public schools?
“Knowledge and learning, generally diffused throughout a community, being essential to the preservation of a free government; it shall be the duty of the General Assembly to encourage, by all suitable means, moral, intellectual, scientific, and agricultural improvement; and to provide, by law, for a general and uniform system of Common Schools, wherein tuition shall be without charge, and equally open to all.”
Been in the state constitution for coming up on 200 years. Article 8.
Makes me think of this story from Charles Barkley:
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Bill Russell called me one time… He says, “Charles Barkley.” I said, “Yes, sir, Mr. Russell.”
“You grew up in Alabama. Right?” I said, “Yes, sir.”
He says, “Did you go to public school?” I said, “Yes, sir.”
He says, “Did the cops ever come to your neighborhood?” I said, “Yes sir.”
He said, “Any of the houses ever on fire and the firemen come?” I said, “Yes, sir.”
He said, “I don’t want to see your black *** on TV complaining about your taxes anymore.” I says, “What do you mean?”
He says, “So now that you got money you don’t want to help other people out, but when you were poor, other people took care of you.” And I says, “You know what, Mr. Russell, you will never hear me complain about my taxes again.”
And it was a very interesting lesson for me, because I do think rich people should pay more taxes. I’m blessed to be one of them, and we should pay more in taxes. I learned my lesson. I never complain about taxes.
https://kottke.org/18/04/how-bill-russell-stopped-charles-barkley-from-complaining-about-taxes