School vouchers are a mess in Ohio, talk about a money grab.
Two days before the deadline for a remedy, Republicans in the Ohio House and Senate can’t agree on a solution for Ohio’s school voucher program.
https://www.dispatch.com/news/20200129/ohio-house-senate-members-divided-over-school-voucher-fix?utm_source=SFMC&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Columbus%20Dispatch%20todays-news%202020-01-30&utm_content=COLD_CD&utm_term=013020
What both chambers are trying to stop is a massive increase in the number of school buildings that would be eligible for vouchers. If lawmakers do nothing, the list of under-performing and failing schools would grow on Saturday from 517 to 1,227 for the 2020-2021 school year. Only 255 buildings were eligible for 2018-2019.
School districts say the number of children taking vouchers has skyrocketed along with the list, and that has required some districts to ask their communities for more money.
EdChoice requires public school districts to pay $4,650 toward a student’s private school tuition for grades K-8, and $6,000 for high school – regardless of what the state sends the district. The original thinking was that those dollars provided options for lower-income parents in failing school districts.
The problem, according to Householder and Sen. Matt Dolan, R-Chargin Falls, is that the list of failing schools isn’t accurate.
“Our metric system is wrong, and it’s artificially inflating those numbers,” Dolan said.
More at link above.
So, in essence, EdChoice has almost tripled the number of "underperforming" public schools in their estimation, in the span of one school year. However, many of these so-called "underperfoming" schools don't deserve to be labeled as such, because the criteria is extremely flawed. And so many parents are demanding voucher money that it's leaving many public school districts vastly underfunded. What a mess! Geez, Ohio, first the voting purge mess and now this! Get your act together, ya freakin' Rethugs down there in Columbus!
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