The Case Against Private School Vouchers

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What are vouchers?

North Carolina’s private school voucher system, formed in 2013 by Republican lawmakers under the misleading name “Opportunity Scholarships,” works by providing special taxpayer-funded vouchers that families can use to pay private school tuition.

According to the NC State Education Assistance Authority, which oversees the program, 544 private schools currently receive vouchers through the program. Nearly all participating private schools are religious, and the vast majority of those (though not all) are Christian. Altogether, those 544 schools will receive nearly $132 million in taxpayer-funded vouchers in the 2022-2023 school year.

Here is what you need to know…

  • North Carolina General Assembly is pouring over a billion dollars into private school vouchers this year, paid for by taxpayers, under the marketing term “Opportunity Scholarships”
  • The large majority of private schools receiving vouchers are religious, and most of these are fundamentalist evangelical schools that mix sectarian religious instruction with academics
  • Private schools are not open to everyone. These schools can and often do discriminate against which families are eligible to attend. For example, many voucher recipient schools require their families to regularly attend their church.
  • Most vouchers do not go to needy families. The large majority of applicants households make six figures or more every year, and 1 in 6 makes more than a quarter million each year.
  • According to state administrators, North Carolina’s massive voucher expansion will remove at least $200 million out of the public school system, which educates more than 80% of North Carolina’s kids.
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What’s the impact in your community?

What can you do?

Private school vouchers are a product of partisan gerrymandering in our state legislature.

Voters are not powerless. Here are three things you can do today: