January 5, 2023 • 23 mins
In this episode of IEA's HOTLINE Podcast, we discuss vouchers — taxpayer funded government subsidies for private schools or vendors that syphon scarce and desperately needed tax dollars away from public school classroom. The panel discusses how voucher proponents cloak voucher schemes in benign language like "school choice" or "scholarships" and how other states that adopt the concept have not seen promised educational outcomes.
Joining this discussion are central members of IEA's Lobby Team:
- IEA President Layne McInelly
- IEA Executive Director Paul Stark
- IEA Associate Executive Director Matt Compton
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Mike Journee (00:13):
Welcome to Idaho education Association's hotline
podcast, a weekly discussionabout what's happening at the
Idaho legislature around publiceducation, and the policy
priorities of ies members. I EAAmembers, our public school
educators from all over thestate. They're Idaho's most
important education experts, andthey use their influence to
fight for free quality andequitable public education for
(00:36):
every student in the state. I'mMike journee, communications
director at the IEA and I'll beyour host for this episode of
hotline. Today we discuss likelylegislation coming during the
2023 legislative session thatwould bring vouchers to Idaho
vouchers or taxpayer fundedgovernment subsidies for private
schools or vendors that siphonscarce and desperately needed
(00:57):
tax dollars away from publicschool classrooms. Joining me
today for the conversation ourcentral members of ies Bobby
team IEA President les McAnallyIEA, Executive Director Paul
Stark, an AES AssociateExecutive Director, Matt
competent. Well, guys, thanksfor joining me today and having
this conversation aboutvouchers. You know, in the lead
(01:20):
up to the legislative session onJanuary 10. There have been a
lot of headlines, a lot ofjockeying around this around
this particular education issuevouchers. And the buzzers really
started around the specialsession on September one when
some pretty prominent lawmakersvowed to use at least some of
the $330 million set aside for Kthrough 12 education during that
(01:44):
special session for vouchers. SoMatt, tell us a little bit about
what we're expecting around thisissue when lawmakers can be on
January 10.
Matt Compton (01:54):
Yeah, for sure. I don't think that there have been
hand stacked on any individualpiece of legislation on what is
going what is going to be themost popular. But there are
several lawmakers who areworking on different forms of
voucher legislation. I expectthere'll be four or five
proposals, and it will be just amatter of which Bill rises to
(02:17):
the top with the most amount ofcritical mass behind it. And
that will likely be the onethat's put forward that
stakeholders will have to pushback against.
Mike Journee (02:27):
So I remember see vouchers as as big as taxpayer
funded government subsidies forfor private institutions and
vendors. Outside of the publicschool classrooms, Elaine so
tell us a little bit about whyour members are so adamant in
their opposition to this and whythey have been for so long.
Layne McInelly (02:46):
Yeah, they're adamant against vouchers,
because our public school systemright now is not fully funded.
We don't have an equitablesystem across the state right
now. And so if you're going tostart pulling tax payer public
funded schools money away fromus, then it's going to just
become harder, we're going tohave larger class sizes, we're
going to have schools that don'thave science labs, we're going
(03:07):
to have schools that do havescience labs, we're going to
have a wide variety ofopportunities out there for our
students. And we as educatorswant to make sure that we're
providing the best publiceducation for all students
across Idaho, not just thosethat can pass a levee or a bond.
And so we need to make sure thatour schools are fully funded
before we even think abouttaking money away from them.
Mike Journee (03:30):
Right. And, Paul, you've talked a little bit about
this, about the fact that thisis not a new issue. This is
something that comes back quitefrequently to legislature, and
we're expecting a prettysignificant fight this year, if
early positioning is anyindication. So
Paul Stark (03:46):
yeah, we've seen this. We've seen schemes like
this, come and go over theyears, I personally have
testified on at least a halfdozen times on schemes like this
over and over again. And I knowthey were there before I came to
the IAEA. So they keep taking arun at it. And essentially, it's
the same thing in a differentdifferent model. It's taking
(04:08):
public dollars, and it could bethrough tax credits, it could be
through all kinds of differentmechanisms. But at the bottom
line, taxpayer dollars areflowing to private, exclusionary
schools and away from publicschools. Right.
Mike Journee (04:21):
And Matt labels matter. We've talked a lot about
about the words that are usedaround this concept of taking
public dollars away from publicschool classrooms. And, and and
proponents of this idea, reallytried to use benign language,
things like school choice thingslike scholarships, those kinds
of things. Talk a little bitabout those kinds of different
(04:43):
concepts and and and what we canwhat we're going to be hearing
from proponents of thislegislative session again,
Matt Compton (04:50):
I think the most recent tagline that I've heard,
is fun students, not systems.
Also parental choice. These areall just a I'm examples of the
proponents looking for ways topull public tax dollars away
from public school systems toassign $1 figure, like $1,500,
to a particular student, so thatthey could take that allocation
(05:16):
to a different a differentprivate school, parochial school
and pay for tuition.
Mike Journee (05:23):
Yeah. And these, and the reason why they go out
of their way to avoid the labelvoucher, right? We don't let
them do that, because it isstill a voucher. And but there's
a reason for that. It's becausethis has proven to be
controversial in other parts ofthe country, and is and here as
well. And it's proven to belargely ineffective in other
places, right.
Matt Compton (05:41):
Yeah. And when we do our polling of tax taxpayers
or the the general public, folksknow that if they hear vouchers,
they're not in favor of it. Soit's important that those
proponents of quote, unquote,school choice, deviate away from
using the word voucher, youwon't hear them say, Yes, I'm in
(06:02):
favor of a voucher program.
They'll say, in fact, I'm infavor of a tax credit system or
scheme, something like that
Mike Journee (06:08):
a scholarship or school choice, or parents
choice, which, which are alllabels. Of course, anybody who's
not really intimately familiarwith education policy is going
to say, of course, I'm in favorof choice, right? It's one of
those kind of words, that's,that's very benign in it. But at
the same time, it really doesimpact our, our public schools,
Layne McInelly (06:26):
in saying that Mike, parents have school choice
right now, the parents candecide to take their child to a
public school down the road fromthe one that they're attending,
or they could choose a publiccharter school, or they could
choose a magnet school. Thereare many different options out
there for parents, if the parentisn't happy with the education,
they're receiving at the currentschool, that their child is at
(06:47):
what people are talking aboutwhen they're talking about
school choice, or parentalchoice is funding private
schools. And that's ultimatelywhat we don't want. We want our
students in our public schoolsreceiving the best education
that they can provide,
Mike Journee (07:00):
right? Well funded public schools offer a lot of
choice for people. Right. Imean, that's, that's really what
we're getting at here. I mean,they have online options, they
have all kinds of things thatthat proponents would say that
they would like for families tohave that option, but but if
they were to fully fund publicschools, that wouldn't be the
(07:20):
challenge that they that theyface. So. So again, that kind of
brings us to the one thing, wecan't really talk about vouchers
without talking about that kindof chronic underfunding of
public education here in Idaho.
And the fact that, you know,we're constantly talking about
the need for school districts topass bonds and levies in order
to pay fundamental bills, thefact that we're in the middle of
(07:42):
a, a, an educator job vacancycrisis in our state, for both
certified educators and noncertified educators, folks, the
our educational supportprofessionals. And, and, and the
fact that, that they're unableto convince local taxpayers to
pay these or to, to to taxthemselves for these expenses.
(08:06):
So, Paul, is this really givenall all those kinds of things
that we're doing? Is this reallya good time to talk about
buffers? Is there ever a goodtime to talk about vouchers in
that sense?
Paul Stark (08:18):
Well, other states that have gone full bore into
voucher systems or schemes likethat, at the end of the day,
what it turns out is that it'sthe same people that would have
been sending their kids toprivate schools anyway, it
hasn't really helped anybody insociety hasn't changed anything,
except it's taking money awayfrom the public schools. And so,
yeah, is there a good time? Idon't know. I do believe that
(08:40):
there's some fundamental linethat should be drawn between
taxpayer dollars paying forprivate schools. I think there's
something fundamental there, butcurrently, at this time, where
there's just such a heavy, heavyreliance on bonds and levies,
when there is this inability toadequately fund public education
in Idaho, I think, I think thisis there's probably never a good
(09:03):
time. But this certainly isn'tthe right time.
Mike Journee (09:05):
And when you say, an inability, it's really a lack
of political will. Right. Imean, we're talking about a
constitutional mandate for theIdaho legislature to provide me
adequate funding.
Paul Stark (09:13):
Yeah, I mean, what do we have over a billion
dollars in tax revenue cominginto this next legislative
session that they're going todecide? This is a moment I mean,
honestly, if they if they wantedto change public education,
now's the time. This is themoment to do it. And yet, we'll
likely see squabbles overinconsequential things that
really aren't investing. InIdaho's future. There's no
(09:33):
better way to invest in thosefuture than to invest in public
education.
Matt Compton (09:38):
The most recent big push for vouchers has
happened in Arizona. I'm gonnago back to what Paul mentioned.
And they essentially expandedtheir voucher program to be
available to everybody. Whatthey're seeing is that it does
have a remarkable price tag. Andthe people who were taking
advantage it are the same peoplewho are taking who were enrolled
(09:58):
in private schools in the US wasplaced. So there's not a mass
exodus away from our traditionalpublic schools. It just means
now we're funding the educationfor private schools and taking
money away from the traditionalpublic schools. Now, I think
everybody around this tablewould be more than willing to
entertain a conversation aboutfunding private schools, if
we're meeting our constitutionalobligation to actually fund the
(10:20):
one, the public school systemsthat's outlined in the Idaho
constitution.
Mike Journee (10:25):
right lane, and one of the things that we hear
quite often is the fact thatthat are one of the selling
points I guess, the proponentslike to use is that this is
intended to provide lower incomefamilies an opportunity to
provide their kids a bettereducation, outside of public
schools, when in reality, whatMatt just was was talking about
(10:46):
was, was public school tuitionis often much higher than the
voucher amount. And thedifference is something that
lower income families familiesreally can't afford, right?
Yeah, when
Layne McInelly (10:57):
you look at the private schools around Idaho,
that are charging 12 $15,000 ayear for tuition, and the
government is going to subsidizea voucher for them for $8,000,
or lower income families arestill going to be able to afford
to send their child to privateschool because they can't, they
can't afford that additional$4,000. What we need to look at
(11:20):
is stop being 51st in the nationand per pupil spending and look
at funding our public schools sothat we can have smaller class
sizes, we can have up to datecurriculum, we can have
certified educator in everysingle classroom, we can staff
our schools properly, so thatthe children are receiving the
education that they deserve.
Right. And
Mike Journee (11:37):
as an educator, as a public school educator
yourself, this is an importantpoint, I think that that public
schools, take everybody whocomes in the door and who wants
an education, right? Privateschools have an option, they can
they can discriminate againstwho they want to bring in and
for whatever reason, it may beso so talk a little bit about
(11:58):
that, and the kind of theuniversal benefit that public
schools offer versus versusprivate schools.
Layne McInelly (12:05):
So every child in Idaho deserves a quality
education. And like you said,private schools can discriminate
whether it's because they're onan IEP or because of their
religion, or whatever it may be,they can turn those students
down. And public schools willnot we will take every single
child and we will educate thatchild to the best of our
(12:26):
abilities. And so we need tomake sure that we don't have the
opportunity for certain studentsto receive an education and
others not by having thesevouchers be created in Idaho.
Paul Stark (12:39):
Let me let me make one thing clear too, in case any
of our listeners are wonderingabout this, it will 100% be the
rural communities that pay thebill for a voucher scheme. It
money will decrease in our ruralcommunities as a result of these
sorts of things. This is not asour public schools are currently
(13:01):
where we aim to provide topnotch education no matter what
your zip code is. This is a billthat will be paid by our rural
communities.
Mike Journee (13:10):
So one of the one of the disconnects, that seems
to me that voucher proponentshave with their argument in
favor of public schools, theyoften argue that that this is
going to provide a little bitmore oversight as to how public
dollars are spent in education,which seems kind of crazy to me
in some ways, because of thefact that that between the
(13:32):
legislature and local electedschool boards, and all the
elected officials that have anopportunity to touch education
policy, and to provide fundingfor education policy, are
elected officials, or appointedby elected officials versus
private schools, which havevirtually no oversight of of how
they are operated and what theirbudget is other than their their
(13:56):
their selected board membersthat they might have on their
private board in the right map.
Matt Compton (13:59):
Yeah. I don't know how they arrived at the
conclusion that there would begreater oversight. I know that
public private schools in Idahoare likely very well run they
have long waiting lists ofstudents who are looking to get
in, which is an interesting sidepoint to say that if we were to
expand choice, quote unquote,choice, would these private
(14:20):
schools actually be able toabsorb any more additional
students? I don't believe so.
But the kind of oversight or thekind of oversight or
transparency that we need. Whenit comes to public school
dollars. It's just it's notbuilt into the private school
model. I would certainly like tosee investments in public
(14:42):
education, to a point where allparents felt like their local
public school was the optimalparental choice for them and
their families. Unfortunately,because of the chronic
underfunding, we have too few ofadults in buildings, we know
that there are too fewclassified staff, we're finding
it very, very difficult toattract and retain highly
(15:05):
qualified educators, we'recoming up with emergency
solutions to ensure that there'sjust a human being in
classrooms. And that thatdoesn't give our students the
opportunity for the besteducation possible. They need to
have a qualified certifiededucator in the front of the
(15:25):
room, providing them with a highquality education, we should be
really focusing on the systemthat 98% of our families in
Idaho choose. And that is thepublic school system and making
taxpayer dollar investments intothat system before there's any
conversation about funding somekind of outside program through
(15:45):
vouchers or whatever taxcredits, I want to see Idaho
lawmakers do what Idaho votersasks them to do. And that's make
substantive investments continueinvesting in public schools,
surveys, after survey poll afterpoll indicates that the number
one issue on taxpayer mind iscontinued investments in public
(16:06):
schools and protecting ruralschools.
Mike Journee (16:11):
And that goes back decades. We have public policy
surveys going back decadessaying that very same thing.
Paul Stark (16:17):
You know, I was thinking about the the you know,
Idaho is generally very fiscallyconservative, we're very
careful. And that has yieldedbenefits to the state at times.
But so you know, we're lookingat this next session with a lot
of tax revenue, extra taxrevenue. But if if the state
were to buy into one of thesevoucher schemes at this
(16:38):
legislative session, it's it'sunclear to me that in the
future, this wouldn't cost us awhole lot of money had had one
of these been adopted in 2012,we would have seen some really
hard times because all of thismoney is being saved on siphoned
off. It's also noteworthy to saythe underfunding has created a
problem. And now someone's goingto come in and sell us the
(17:00):
solution. And I find thatrepugnant, because they the the
underfunding, and the chronicunderfunding has created crisis.
This isn't the doing of thepublic education system. This
isn't the superintendents, thesearen't the educators that are
that are in those rooms, thecrisis has been created entirely
by our state legislature thathas just refused to do the right
(17:23):
thing to do what theConstitution requires them to
do. So they've created theproblem. And now the Hawks start
sweeping and saying, We're gonnasell you the problem. And guess
what the price tag for thatsolution is very, very high,
it's higher than it would be tosimply meet your constitutional
mandate from the very beginning.
And allow public education toflourish, allow it to be what it
can be. Because with properfunding, public education,
(17:46):
Idaho, can be the hallmark ofthe country, this can be the
high watermark, we have, I mean,I've visited with educators
throughout every corner of thestate, highest quality people
you can ever imagine. And giventhe proper resources, we would
knock it out of the park. Butinstead they want to, you know,
like Oliver Twist, they want togive us just one bowl of
(18:06):
porridge. And and then they wantto sell us the solution.
Mike Journee (18:11):
And enemies of public education have done a
really fine job of making thatargument and defining defining
those those sideboards aroundpublic education and starving.
The US have the resources thatour members need in order to
provide that public education.
And at some point, it becomes aself fulfilling prophecy, right?
Where they're where the lookwhat they can't get the results
(18:34):
with the money that they've beengiven. Then, at the same time,
you know, it's there, they'restarving us with the other hand.
Matt Compton (18:43):
The opposition says they'll constantly say,
they begged the question, howmuch is enough? And it would be
really easy to figure that out,run some kind of adequacy study
on what does the public schoolsystem need to be hold? That
would be a small investment, toreally determine what the school
systems need to meet the needsof students in the 21st century.
Paul Stark (19:06):
And instead of actually talking about funding
talking about giving us theresources to be exceptional,
which is there, the potential isall there. Instead, we spend all
this time with fake news likecritical race theory, which is
absolutely bunk. It came out ofnowhere and there's zero proof
to it. What about the attack onpublic library or public
librarians another fake issue adog whistle on these culture
(19:29):
wars that they rather wage thanactually focusing in on what we
can do to help kids become greatsocial emotional learning is the
other one. That's the newestculture Ward's is your that some
people want to focus on insteadof actually looking at the real
problem. And the real problemis, we just haven't given our
public schools the chance to beexcellent.
Mike Journee (19:50):
And a lot of the a lot of the the push behind some
of this it comes from some somepretty dark money from out of
state From interest that thatwould would love to sell those
solutions to public schools orto parents or to or to a state
government.
Paul Stark (20:12):
You know, one of the things to notice when you say
like, you know, there's acoordinated effort here, it's
not surprising that criticalrace theory, all of a sudden,
this bomb drops out of nowhere,no one saw it coming. And all of
a sudden, that same bomb dropsin other states around the
country. Let's let's not makeany let's not be naive about
this. This is a coordinatednationwide effort to discredit
(20:35):
public education. And if anybodythinks that's not true, the
facts just belie that belief.
Because Absolutely, we see allof these things with the attacks
on librarians. We see it happenin every other state. It's a
coordinated attack on publiceducation. Let's call it what it
is
Matt Compton (20:49):
it here in Idaho, it prompted investigation into
public schools during thesummer, then Lieutenant Governor
McKeon put together anindoctrination Task Force to
filter out all of the bad thingsthat are happening in schools.
And the committee that she puttogether, the only
recommendations they had at theend of that task force was
(21:10):
school choice, school choiceschool choice, we have to let
money follow students out oftraditional public schools, to
wherever their parent wants tosend them. So again, you can you
can see the masquerade in frontof you, when when folks are
talking poorly about publiceducation, decreasing the
public's confidence in thesystem. And then their their
(21:32):
solution is defund publicschools so that we can fund
private schools. It's rightthere in front of you. It's an
easy equation.
Paul Stark (21:39):
Some people phrase this as it's a solution, looking
for a problem. And that's whatwe're seeing. They know what the
solution is. And that is theysee these big line items for
public education. And they wantthis to go to for profit.
Mike Journee (21:52):
And, and that's probably why we see so many
different iterations of the sameconcept that come back with
different monitors withdifferent different shades of
the same idea coming back everyyear, year after year, like you
mentioned earlier, Paul, you'vebeen here and testified on this
issue a number of number times,right? So
Layne McInelly (22:08):
if we look across the country, like Matt
said, it has not been successfulin Arizona, it has not been
successful in Ohio, it has notbeen successful in multiple
states. And so why would we wantto continue down a path that has
shown time and time again, thatit is not successful, and it
hasn't worked?
Mike Journee (22:23):
Well, gentlemen, thank you for the conversation.
It was fantastic. And lookingforward to our ability to
continue fighting for Idaho'spublic school educators and
making sure that we can keepvouchers out of our public
schools.
Matt Compton (22:38):
I don't think this is the last time we're going to
be talking about vouchers.
Paul Stark (22:42):
Thank you. Thanks, Mike. Thanks.
Mike Journee (22:45):
Thank you for listening to Idaho education
Association's hotline podcast,and it's important discussion
about likely voucher legislationcoming during the 2023
legislative session. Thanks aswell to our guests IEA President
Lee McAnally IEA executivedirector Paul Stark, and I yeas
Associate Executive DirectorMatt Compton. Please watch for
future updates about newepisodes on IEA social media
(23:07):
channels or sign up for emailupdates on our website at Idaho
eaa.org. I'm Mike journee. Andas always, I hope you join me in
thanking Idaho's public schooleducators for everything they do
for our State students, familiesand public schools.
Welcome to Idaho education Association's hotline
podcast, a weekly discussionabout what's happening at the
Idaho legislature around publiceducation, and the policy
priorities of ies members. I EAAmembers, our public school
educators from all over thestate. They're Idaho's most
important education experts, andthey use their influence to
fight for free quality andequitable public education for
(00:36):
every student in the state. I'mMike journee, communications
director at the IEA and I'll beyour host for this episode of
hotline. Today we discuss likelylegislation coming during the
2023 legislative session thatwould bring vouchers to Idaho
vouchers or taxpayer fundedgovernment subsidies for private
schools or vendors that siphonscarce and desperately needed
(00:57):
tax dollars away from publicschool classrooms. Joining me
today for the conversation ourcentral members of ies Bobby
team IEA President les McAnallyIEA, Executive Director Paul
Stark, an AES AssociateExecutive Director, Matt
competent. Well, guys, thanksfor joining me today and having
this conversation aboutvouchers. You know, in the lead
(01:20):
up to the legislative session onJanuary 10. There have been a
lot of headlines, a lot ofjockeying around this around
this particular education issuevouchers. And the buzzers really
started around the specialsession on September one when
some pretty prominent lawmakersvowed to use at least some of
the $330 million set aside for Kthrough 12 education during that
(01:44):
special session for vouchers. SoMatt, tell us a little bit about
what we're expecting around thisissue when lawmakers can be on
January 10.
Matt Compton (01:54):
Yeah, for sure. I don't think that there have been
hand stacked on any individualpiece of legislation on what is
going what is going to be themost popular. But there are
several lawmakers who areworking on different forms of
voucher legislation. I expectthere'll be four or five
proposals, and it will be just amatter of which Bill rises to
(02:17):
the top with the most amount ofcritical mass behind it. And
that will likely be the onethat's put forward that
stakeholders will have to pushback against.
Mike Journee (02:27):
So I remember see vouchers as as big as taxpayer
funded government subsidies forfor private institutions and
vendors. Outside of the publicschool classrooms, Elaine so
tell us a little bit about whyour members are so adamant in
their opposition to this and whythey have been for so long.
Layne McInelly (02:46):
Yeah, they're adamant against vouchers,
because our public school systemright now is not fully funded.
We don't have an equitablesystem across the state right
now. And so if you're going tostart pulling tax payer public
funded schools money away fromus, then it's going to just
become harder, we're going tohave larger class sizes, we're
going to have schools that don'thave science labs, we're going
(03:07):
to have schools that do havescience labs, we're going to
have a wide variety ofopportunities out there for our
students. And we as educatorswant to make sure that we're
providing the best publiceducation for all students
across Idaho, not just thosethat can pass a levee or a bond.
And so we need to make sure thatour schools are fully funded
before we even think abouttaking money away from them.
Mike Journee (03:30):
Right. And, Paul, you've talked a little bit about
this, about the fact that thisis not a new issue. This is
something that comes back quitefrequently to legislature, and
we're expecting a prettysignificant fight this year, if
early positioning is anyindication. So
Paul Stark (03:46):
yeah, we've seen this. We've seen schemes like
this, come and go over theyears, I personally have
testified on at least a halfdozen times on schemes like this
over and over again. And I knowthey were there before I came to
the IAEA. So they keep taking arun at it. And essentially, it's
the same thing in a differentdifferent model. It's taking
(04:08):
public dollars, and it could bethrough tax credits, it could be
through all kinds of differentmechanisms. But at the bottom
line, taxpayer dollars areflowing to private, exclusionary
schools and away from publicschools. Right.
Mike Journee (04:21):
And Matt labels matter. We've talked a lot about
about the words that are usedaround this concept of taking
public dollars away from publicschool classrooms. And, and and
proponents of this idea, reallytried to use benign language,
things like school choice thingslike scholarships, those kinds
of things. Talk a little bitabout those kinds of different
(04:43):
concepts and and and what we canwhat we're going to be hearing
from proponents of thislegislative session again,
Matt Compton (04:50):
I think the most recent tagline that I've heard,
is fun students, not systems.
Also parental choice. These areall just a I'm examples of the
proponents looking for ways topull public tax dollars away
from public school systems toassign $1 figure, like $1,500,
to a particular student, so thatthey could take that allocation
(05:16):
to a different a differentprivate school, parochial school
and pay for tuition.
Mike Journee (05:23):
Yeah. And these, and the reason why they go out
of their way to avoid the labelvoucher, right? We don't let
them do that, because it isstill a voucher. And but there's
a reason for that. It's becausethis has proven to be
controversial in other parts ofthe country, and is and here as
well. And it's proven to belargely ineffective in other
places, right.
Matt Compton (05:41):
Yeah. And when we do our polling of tax taxpayers
or the the general public, folksknow that if they hear vouchers,
they're not in favor of it. Soit's important that those
proponents of quote, unquote,school choice, deviate away from
using the word voucher, youwon't hear them say, Yes, I'm in
(06:02):
favor of a voucher program.
They'll say, in fact, I'm infavor of a tax credit system or
scheme, something like that
Mike Journee (06:08):
a scholarship or school choice, or parents
choice, which, which are alllabels. Of course, anybody who's
not really intimately familiarwith education policy is going
to say, of course, I'm in favorof choice, right? It's one of
those kind of words, that's,that's very benign in it. But at
the same time, it really doesimpact our, our public schools,
Layne McInelly (06:26):
in saying that Mike, parents have school choice
right now, the parents candecide to take their child to a
public school down the road fromthe one that they're attending,
or they could choose a publiccharter school, or they could
choose a magnet school. Thereare many different options out
there for parents, if the parentisn't happy with the education,
they're receiving at the currentschool, that their child is at
(06:47):
what people are talking aboutwhen they're talking about
school choice, or parentalchoice is funding private
schools. And that's ultimatelywhat we don't want. We want our
students in our public schoolsreceiving the best education
that they can provide,
Mike Journee (07:00):
right? Well funded public schools offer a lot of
choice for people. Right. Imean, that's, that's really what
we're getting at here. I mean,they have online options, they
have all kinds of things thatthat proponents would say that
they would like for families tohave that option, but but if
they were to fully fund publicschools, that wouldn't be the
(07:20):
challenge that they that theyface. So. So again, that kind of
brings us to the one thing, wecan't really talk about vouchers
without talking about that kindof chronic underfunding of
public education here in Idaho.
And the fact that, you know,we're constantly talking about
the need for school districts topass bonds and levies in order
to pay fundamental bills, thefact that we're in the middle of
(07:42):
a, a, an educator job vacancycrisis in our state, for both
certified educators and noncertified educators, folks, the
our educational supportprofessionals. And, and, and the
fact that, that they're unableto convince local taxpayers to
pay these or to, to to taxthemselves for these expenses.
(08:06):
So, Paul, is this really givenall all those kinds of things
that we're doing? Is this reallya good time to talk about
buffers? Is there ever a goodtime to talk about vouchers in
that sense?
Paul Stark (08:18):
Well, other states that have gone full bore into
voucher systems or schemes likethat, at the end of the day,
what it turns out is that it'sthe same people that would have
been sending their kids toprivate schools anyway, it
hasn't really helped anybody insociety hasn't changed anything,
except it's taking money awayfrom the public schools. And so,
yeah, is there a good time? Idon't know. I do believe that
(08:40):
there's some fundamental linethat should be drawn between
taxpayer dollars paying forprivate schools. I think there's
something fundamental there, butcurrently, at this time, where
there's just such a heavy, heavyreliance on bonds and levies,
when there is this inability toadequately fund public education
in Idaho, I think, I think thisis there's probably never a good
(09:03):
time. But this certainly isn'tthe right time.
Mike Journee (09:05):
And when you say, an inability, it's really a lack
of political will. Right. Imean, we're talking about a
constitutional mandate for theIdaho legislature to provide me
adequate funding.
Paul Stark (09:13):
Yeah, I mean, what do we have over a billion
dollars in tax revenue cominginto this next legislative
session that they're going todecide? This is a moment I mean,
honestly, if they if they wantedto change public education,
now's the time. This is themoment to do it. And yet, we'll
likely see squabbles overinconsequential things that
really aren't investing. InIdaho's future. There's no
(09:33):
better way to invest in thosefuture than to invest in public
education.
Matt Compton (09:38):
The most recent big push for vouchers has
happened in Arizona. I'm gonnago back to what Paul mentioned.
And they essentially expandedtheir voucher program to be
available to everybody. Whatthey're seeing is that it does
have a remarkable price tag. Andthe people who were taking
advantage it are the same peoplewho are taking who were enrolled
(09:58):
in private schools in the US wasplaced. So there's not a mass
exodus away from our traditionalpublic schools. It just means
now we're funding the educationfor private schools and taking
money away from the traditionalpublic schools. Now, I think
everybody around this tablewould be more than willing to
entertain a conversation aboutfunding private schools, if
we're meeting our constitutionalobligation to actually fund the
(10:20):
one, the public school systemsthat's outlined in the Idaho
constitution.
Mike Journee (10:25):
right lane, and one of the things that we hear
quite often is the fact thatthat are one of the selling
points I guess, the proponentslike to use is that this is
intended to provide lower incomefamilies an opportunity to
provide their kids a bettereducation, outside of public
schools, when in reality, whatMatt just was was talking about
(10:46):
was, was public school tuitionis often much higher than the
voucher amount. And thedifference is something that
lower income families familiesreally can't afford, right?
Yeah, when
Layne McInelly (10:57):
you look at the private schools around Idaho,
that are charging 12 $15,000 ayear for tuition, and the
government is going to subsidizea voucher for them for $8,000,
or lower income families arestill going to be able to afford
to send their child to privateschool because they can't, they
can't afford that additional$4,000. What we need to look at
(11:20):
is stop being 51st in the nationand per pupil spending and look
at funding our public schools sothat we can have smaller class
sizes, we can have up to datecurriculum, we can have
certified educator in everysingle classroom, we can staff
our schools properly, so thatthe children are receiving the
education that they deserve.
Right. And
Mike Journee (11:37):
as an educator, as a public school educator
yourself, this is an importantpoint, I think that that public
schools, take everybody whocomes in the door and who wants
an education, right? Privateschools have an option, they can
they can discriminate againstwho they want to bring in and
for whatever reason, it may beso so talk a little bit about
(11:58):
that, and the kind of theuniversal benefit that public
schools offer versus versusprivate schools.
Layne McInelly (12:05):
So every child in Idaho deserves a quality
education. And like you said,private schools can discriminate
whether it's because they're onan IEP or because of their
religion, or whatever it may be,they can turn those students
down. And public schools willnot we will take every single
child and we will educate thatchild to the best of our
(12:26):
abilities. And so we need tomake sure that we don't have the
opportunity for certain studentsto receive an education and
others not by having thesevouchers be created in Idaho.
Paul Stark (12:39):
Let me let me make one thing clear too, in case any
of our listeners are wonderingabout this, it will 100% be the
rural communities that pay thebill for a voucher scheme. It
money will decrease in our ruralcommunities as a result of these
sorts of things. This is not asour public schools are currently
(13:01):
where we aim to provide topnotch education no matter what
your zip code is. This is a billthat will be paid by our rural
communities.
Mike Journee (13:10):
So one of the one of the disconnects, that seems
to me that voucher proponentshave with their argument in
favor of public schools, theyoften argue that that this is
going to provide a little bitmore oversight as to how public
dollars are spent in education,which seems kind of crazy to me
in some ways, because of thefact that that between the
(13:32):
legislature and local electedschool boards, and all the
elected officials that have anopportunity to touch education
policy, and to provide fundingfor education policy, are
elected officials, or appointedby elected officials versus
private schools, which havevirtually no oversight of of how
they are operated and what theirbudget is other than their their
(13:56):
their selected board membersthat they might have on their
private board in the right map.
Matt Compton (13:59):
Yeah. I don't know how they arrived at the
conclusion that there would begreater oversight. I know that
public private schools in Idahoare likely very well run they
have long waiting lists ofstudents who are looking to get
in, which is an interesting sidepoint to say that if we were to
expand choice, quote unquote,choice, would these private
(14:20):
schools actually be able toabsorb any more additional
students? I don't believe so.
But the kind of oversight or thekind of oversight or
transparency that we need. Whenit comes to public school
dollars. It's just it's notbuilt into the private school
model. I would certainly like tosee investments in public
(14:42):
education, to a point where allparents felt like their local
public school was the optimalparental choice for them and
their families. Unfortunately,because of the chronic
underfunding, we have too few ofadults in buildings, we know
that there are too fewclassified staff, we're finding
it very, very difficult toattract and retain highly
(15:05):
qualified educators, we'recoming up with emergency
solutions to ensure that there'sjust a human being in
classrooms. And that thatdoesn't give our students the
opportunity for the besteducation possible. They need to
have a qualified certifiededucator in the front of the
(15:25):
room, providing them with a highquality education, we should be
really focusing on the systemthat 98% of our families in
Idaho choose. And that is thepublic school system and making
taxpayer dollar investments intothat system before there's any
conversation about funding somekind of outside program through
(15:45):
vouchers or whatever taxcredits, I want to see Idaho
lawmakers do what Idaho votersasks them to do. And that's make
substantive investments continueinvesting in public schools,
surveys, after survey poll afterpoll indicates that the number
one issue on taxpayer mind iscontinued investments in public
(16:06):
schools and protecting ruralschools.
Mike Journee (16:11):
And that goes back decades. We have public policy
surveys going back decadessaying that very same thing.
Paul Stark (16:17):
You know, I was thinking about the the you know,
Idaho is generally very fiscallyconservative, we're very
careful. And that has yieldedbenefits to the state at times.
But so you know, we're lookingat this next session with a lot
of tax revenue, extra taxrevenue. But if if the state
were to buy into one of thesevoucher schemes at this
(16:38):
legislative session, it's it'sunclear to me that in the
future, this wouldn't cost us awhole lot of money had had one
of these been adopted in 2012,we would have seen some really
hard times because all of thismoney is being saved on siphoned
off. It's also noteworthy to saythe underfunding has created a
problem. And now someone's goingto come in and sell us the
(17:00):
solution. And I find thatrepugnant, because they the the
underfunding, and the chronicunderfunding has created crisis.
This isn't the doing of thepublic education system. This
isn't the superintendents, thesearen't the educators that are
that are in those rooms, thecrisis has been created entirely
by our state legislature thathas just refused to do the right
(17:23):
thing to do what theConstitution requires them to
do. So they've created theproblem. And now the Hawks start
sweeping and saying, We're gonnasell you the problem. And guess
what the price tag for thatsolution is very, very high,
it's higher than it would be tosimply meet your constitutional
mandate from the very beginning.
And allow public education toflourish, allow it to be what it
can be. Because with properfunding, public education,
(17:46):
Idaho, can be the hallmark ofthe country, this can be the
high watermark, we have, I mean,I've visited with educators
throughout every corner of thestate, highest quality people
you can ever imagine. And giventhe proper resources, we would
knock it out of the park. Butinstead they want to, you know,
like Oliver Twist, they want togive us just one bowl of
(18:06):
porridge. And and then they wantto sell us the solution.
Mike Journee (18:11):
And enemies of public education have done a
really fine job of making thatargument and defining defining
those those sideboards aroundpublic education and starving.
The US have the resources thatour members need in order to
provide that public education.
And at some point, it becomes aself fulfilling prophecy, right?
Where they're where the lookwhat they can't get the results
(18:34):
with the money that they've beengiven. Then, at the same time,
you know, it's there, they'restarving us with the other hand.
Matt Compton (18:43):
The opposition says they'll constantly say,
they begged the question, howmuch is enough? And it would be
really easy to figure that out,run some kind of adequacy study
on what does the public schoolsystem need to be hold? That
would be a small investment, toreally determine what the school
systems need to meet the needsof students in the 21st century.
Paul Stark (19:06):
And instead of actually talking about funding
talking about giving us theresources to be exceptional,
which is there, the potential isall there. Instead, we spend all
this time with fake news likecritical race theory, which is
absolutely bunk. It came out ofnowhere and there's zero proof
to it. What about the attack onpublic library or public
librarians another fake issue adog whistle on these culture
(19:29):
wars that they rather wage thanactually focusing in on what we
can do to help kids become greatsocial emotional learning is the
other one. That's the newestculture Ward's is your that some
people want to focus on insteadof actually looking at the real
problem. And the real problemis, we just haven't given our
public schools the chance to beexcellent.
Mike Journee (19:50):
And a lot of the a lot of the the push behind some
of this it comes from some somepretty dark money from out of
state From interest that thatwould would love to sell those
solutions to public schools orto parents or to or to a state
government.
Paul Stark (20:12):
You know, one of the things to notice when you say
like, you know, there's acoordinated effort here, it's
not surprising that criticalrace theory, all of a sudden,
this bomb drops out of nowhere,no one saw it coming. And all of
a sudden, that same bomb dropsin other states around the
country. Let's let's not makeany let's not be naive about
this. This is a coordinatednationwide effort to discredit
(20:35):
public education. And if anybodythinks that's not true, the
facts just belie that belief.
Because Absolutely, we see allof these things with the attacks
on librarians. We see it happenin every other state. It's a
coordinated attack on publiceducation. Let's call it what it
is
Matt Compton (20:49):
it here in Idaho, it prompted investigation into
public schools during thesummer, then Lieutenant Governor
McKeon put together anindoctrination Task Force to
filter out all of the bad thingsthat are happening in schools.
And the committee that she puttogether, the only
recommendations they had at theend of that task force was
(21:10):
school choice, school choiceschool choice, we have to let
money follow students out oftraditional public schools, to
wherever their parent wants tosend them. So again, you can you
can see the masquerade in frontof you, when when folks are
talking poorly about publiceducation, decreasing the
public's confidence in thesystem. And then their their
(21:32):
solution is defund publicschools so that we can fund
private schools. It's rightthere in front of you. It's an
easy equation.
Paul Stark (21:39):
Some people phrase this as it's a solution, looking
for a problem. And that's whatwe're seeing. They know what the
solution is. And that is theysee these big line items for
public education. And they wantthis to go to for profit.
Mike Journee (21:52):
And, and that's probably why we see so many
different iterations of the sameconcept that come back with
different monitors withdifferent different shades of
the same idea coming back everyyear, year after year, like you
mentioned earlier, Paul, you'vebeen here and testified on this
issue a number of number times,right? So
Layne McInelly (22:08):
if we look across the country, like Matt
said, it has not been successfulin Arizona, it has not been
successful in Ohio, it has notbeen successful in multiple
states. And so why would we wantto continue down a path that has
shown time and time again, thatit is not successful, and it
hasn't worked?
Mike Journee (22:23):
Well, gentlemen, thank you for the conversation.
It was fantastic. And lookingforward to our ability to
continue fighting for Idaho'spublic school educators and
making sure that we can keepvouchers out of our public
schools.
Matt Compton (22:38):
I don't think this is the last time we're going to
be talking about vouchers.
Paul Stark (22:42):
Thank you. Thanks, Mike. Thanks.
Mike Journee (22:45):
Thank you for listening to Idaho education
Association's hotline podcast,and it's important discussion
about likely voucher legislationcoming during the 2023
legislative session. Thanks aswell to our guests IEA President
Lee McAnally IEA executivedirector Paul Stark, and I yeas
Associate Executive DirectorMatt Compton. Please watch for
future updates about newepisodes on IEA social media
(23:07):
channels or sign up for emailupdates on our website at Idaho
eaa.org. I'm Mike journee. Andas always, I hope you join me in
thanking Idaho's public schooleducators for everything they do
for our State students, familiesand public schools.
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