School Choice Advocacy

Select Your State:

Learn if school choice options are available in your state

Make your elected official aware of the issue

Connect with other local schools in your area with the same goals to build a voice.
Connect with schools in surrounding states that have a school choice program.
Educate yourself on school choice. The more you know about it, the greater you and your school partners can create community involvement to bring to your elected officials.

School Choice Myths

Myth #1
School choice takes money from traditional public schools.

Fact:

When a state passes a school choice program, money is never diverted from the state education budget; in fact, in many states the education budget was increased dramatically as part of the passage of the choice program.

Myth #2
Private schools are unaccountable: How can we make sure kids are getting a good education?

FACT:

Private schools face the ultimate accountability: If they do not do a good job, parents will unenroll their students. In most states, a student attending a private school through a school choice program must either take the state assessments or nationally norm-referenced tests.

Myth #3
Students do not benefit from private education.

FACT:

Most if not all students who benefit from choice programs are coming out of public schools that are deemed “failing” by their state board of education. At the end of the day, this program is about giving parents a choice.

Myth #4
School choice hurts public schools.

FACT:

Public schools get to keep almost all the federal and local tax dollars and usually a portion of the state funds allocated for each child. As homeschool public and private school enrollment increases school districts’ test scores improve (Cebula, Hall, Tackett 2016).

Myth #5
Private school choice programs violate the separation between church and state.

FACT:

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that private school choice programs are fully constitutional. In the 2010 case Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn, the U.S. Supreme Court concluded that tax-credits going toward religious schools are constitutional. Because school choice funding does not endorse any state church nor pressure students into religion, these programs do not disobey the law.

State courts have upheld the constitutionality of voucher, tax credit scholarship, and ESA programs.

Myth #6
School Choice Programs Are Not Inclusive

FACT:

Not every public school has to take every child. If a student has a special need or wants a special type of programing, the local public school is not required to provide it. The district may set up the service at another location and bus the student all the way across town to participate. Why should there be a different and more onerous standard put on a private school with a different mission and fewer resources at its disposal? If a public school isn’t required to take every child, why should we require a private school to take every child?

Students in school choice programs come from every race, gender, sexual orientation, and ability level. There is a misbelief that school choice programs deny underprivileged students. School choice programs create opportunity for underprivilege students.