Next week, voters in Colorado, Kentucky, and Nebraska will vote on school choice and decide whether or not future funding could be diverted from public schools. Depending on the outcome, rural public schools, and the students and families who rely on them, could suffer disproportionately.
If school choice is supported through a constitutional amendment, these states could join the 11 others who currently offer universal school vouchers, which allow families to take a portion of their state’s education funding away from public schools to pay for their child’s private education.
Supporters argue that school vouchers empower families to choose the best educational path for their children. Critics, however, warn that diverting funds to voucher programs could deepen challenges for public schools – especially in rural areas where public schools are often the only available option.
Across the country, multiple states have been involved in lawsuits against school choice and similar programs, including Utah, South Carolina, and Montana.
Amendment 80, Colorado
Since 1994, Colorado has allowed open enrollment through the Public Schools of Choice law, meaning that any family can enroll in any public school, regardless of their school district. Charter schools and homeschooling are also supported by state legislation. Now, Amendment 80 proposes to codify school choice in the state constitution through a ballot measure, which would allow potential future legislation to create school vouchers.
Proposed by Advance Colorado, a conservative advocacy organization, the language in Amendment 80 does not explicitly say anything about school vouchers. However, a previous version of the initiative put forth by the same organization did include one extra line “Parents and guardians have the right to direct per pupil funding to the schooling of their choice.” Which means, school vouchers.
Karelia Ver Eecke lives in rural Montezuma County, Colorado, and has a daughter who attends school out of their zoned district. While she does support the current open enrollment system, she does not support the school choice amendment because she is concerned it would allow public funding to go to homeschooling and private schools in the future.
“Public schools, while not perfect, are a necessity for many families. Funding is pinched and reworked enough within the state system,” Ver Eecke wrote to the Daily Yonder.
This proposed amendment has become so contentious in the lead up to the election that some groups are resorting to drastic measures to get their message to voters.
On Friday, October 18, a text message in support of Amendment 80 was sent out to Colorado residents which included an audio recording of the Colorado Education Association president Kevin Vick. In the recording, Vick’s voice says “school choice itself is statutory, it has been in our program for 30 years, it has brought bipartisan support and it has worked very well for students for a number of years.”
This sound bite was used entirely out of context, as Kevin Vick, and the Colorado Education Association, have been vocally opposed to Amendment 80. The text message was allegedly sent by Colorado Dawn, a 501(c)(4) funding yeson80.org, but the message did not include a disclaimer of who paid for it, which is required by law.
Rural public schools across the country suffer the most from the implementation of voucher programs, compared to their urban counterparts.
“In rural areas, schools are not just some place that you park the kids for service. They’re community centers. They’re part of the identity,” said Peter Greene, senior contributor for education news at Forbes. Diverting funding from this vital component of a rural community’s culture and identity compromises school’s sustainability.
In Colorado, 146 out of 179 school districts are rural. Frank Reeves is a former educator and the director of operations and strategic partnerships for the Colorado Rural Schools Alliance. Reeves said that over the past 30 years, through both Republican and Democratic trifectas, there has been overwhelming support for school choice.
“I don’t know of anybody who doesn’t support school choice,” Reeves said, referring to the current laws around open enrollment, in an interview with the Daily Yonder. He, and other critics of Amendment 80 do not see any need for this already existing law to be added to the Colorado Constitution.
Amendment 2, Kentucky
School choice is also on the ballot in Kentucky, where school choice legislation has previously been struck down by the Kentucky Supreme Court for unconstitutionally sending taxpayer dollars to private schools. Like Colorado, Kentucky’s proposed constitutional change would allow future legislation to create school vouchers.
By changing the constitution, Amendment 2 on Kentucky’s ballot would allocate taxpayer dollars to private schools, allowing future school choice legislation to pass without pushback from the courts.
- RELATED: Everything you need to know about Amendment 2 in Kentucky
- RELATED: Kentucky Board of Education approves resolution opposing Amendment 2
Dustin Pugel, policy director at the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, said that if Amendment 2 passes, its effects would be most detrimental for rural school districts.
“Proponents will refer to it as school choice. And for a lot of folks in Kentucky – Eastern Kentucky and Western Kentucky primarily – there is no choice for them. It’s public schools or nothing,” said Pugel, in an interview with the Daily Yonder.
If school voucher programs are implemented, the per pupil funding would primarily be going to residents of urban areas with access to private schools, with rural residents seeing none of the benefits.
“80% of Kentucky’s private schools are in 8% of the state’s zip codes,” said Pugel. That 8% is primarily made up of the state’s urban areas of Lexington, Louisville, and northern Kentucky, Pugel said.
The amendment has received strong criticism from teachers and public school supporters for funneling money away from public schools and toward private schools, which would disproportionately harm students in rural Kentucky schools.
Referendum 435, Nebraska
Unlike the constitutional amendments being brought forward in Colorado and Kentucky, Nebraska’s Referendum 435 gives voters the opportunity to repeal controversial school choice legislation that was passed by the Nebraska State Legislature earlier this year.
The law in question, Section 1 of Legislative Bill 1402, currently provides $10 million annually to fund educational scholarships for students attending private schools. Referendum 435 almost didn’t make it on the ballot, either, said Forbes education reporter Peter Greene.
A lawsuit against the proposed referendum argued that LB 1402 was making an appropriation, or an allocation of state money for government programming. In Nebraska, it is unconstitutional to have referendums on appropriation bills. However, the Nebraska Supreme Court sided unanimously against the lawsuit, sending the question to the voters in next week’s general election.
“No voucher program has ever survived a vote by the taxpayers. The voters don’t support them,” Greene said.
This article first appeared on The Daily Yonder and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
