Vouchers short change public schools

From the Florida Times Union

by Julie Delegul

Florida currently operates two school voucher programs.

The McKay Scholarship transmits state funds directly to families of disabled students so that they may attend private schools that might better meet their children's needs.

The Florida Tax Credit voucher, on the other hand, diverts various tax payments to a charity, which funds private school vouchers.

The children, families and taxpayers of Florida deserve better accountability for both of these programs. Florida law mandates accountability for the Florida Tax Credit program.

The state accountability agency, OPPAGA, has produced research summaries that characterize the FTC "Scholarship" Program as a money saver for the state.

The analysis is iffy on a couple of fronts.

Per pupil (non-McKay) voucher funding ($4,106) is less than the cost per pupil for public schools ($6,843).

OPPAGA's analysis, however, glosses over how the program affects the scale operations of our public school districts.

More often than not, the loss of students to nearby private schools does not alter the fixed costs of the public schools that once served them.

Each affected public school loses the entire per pupil amount for each student who leaves, and, according to advocate Sandra Parks, that added up to a loss of nearly $20 million for Duval County alone last year.

Statewide, vouchers cost Florida public schools $214 million.

This diversion of tax dollars would be money well spent, if proponents could provide conclusive empirical evidence that private voucher programs led to improved outcomes for the students who attend them.

Alas, they haven't.

The last apples-to-apples comparison between voucher students and public school students occurred for the school year that ended in 2008.

The conclusion was that voucher students did no better than their socio-economic (read: poor) peers who stayed in the public schools.

Here's where the spin occurs: Proponents want us to think that voucher schools are as good as public schools at large when, in fact, they're on par with only our neediest, often "failing" public schools in terms of outcomes.

A more recent, and more tenuous, "apples-to-oranges-to-last-year's-pears" analysis concludes that "raw gains" among voucher program participants "are smaller" than for poor, voucher-eligible students who remain in public schools, but that those students who stay in private settings year after year "may" see some benefit.

Then again, they may not.

Meanwhile, most of our children, who attend public schools, are being shortchanged by Florida's dodgy defunding experiment.

Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/opinion/letters-readers/2011-09-25/story/lead-letter-vouchers-may-help-students-or-may-not?cid=hp-mostcommented#ixzz1Z4arXrIb