In a year where the state is facing a $1.3 billion budget hole, there are many discussions and opinions on the table regarding where adjustments should be made to best maintain and support the core services and functions of state government. I don’t believe anyone wants to cut education funding, as we all realize the multitude of benefits a good education affords, but there are certainly differing opinions in regards to the best way to spend the dollars we do have. Education savings accounts have captured the attention of legislators this year as one option.
Education savings accounts, also known as vouchers, would allow parents to take a portion of the state’s public dollars being used to educate their child and redirect those dollars onto a debit card that could be used to pay tuition at a private school, online education fees, tutoring, books or other education expenses.
I’m concerned about the logic behind sending taxpayer dollars into private schools by way of a voucher program because it pulls money away from public education. It’s challenging to track the money once it’s out of the state system, which is exactly what a voucher system would allow, bringing accountability concerns to the forefront. Transparency would be difficult to maintain and the lack of oversight would make it challenging to ensure the program could give each student fair and equal opportunities in education.
Our rural schools rely heavily on public dollars to ensure their facilities operate efficiently and I’m concerned voucher programs like education savings accounts would adversely affect our smaller area schools. Public schools are already under pressure to stretch every last penny and if they lose even more public dollars to private institutions, it’s hard to argue we won’t see detrimental effects.
This approach to education reform will undoubtedly help some people, as they could tap into public dollars and reroute that money to pay for their kids’ private education expenses, but in most cases, that choice shouldn’t be allowed at the expense of the rest of Oklahoma’s public school students.
Aside from questions of the constitutionality of a voucher system and the state’s obligation to provide public education, I have not seen any research to date that indicates students who are educated within a voucher system have higher academic abilities. Instead of completely uprooting the state’s public school foundation in exchange for a voucher program that may be no better or worse than what we have now, perhaps a better approach is to properly fund public education, pay our teachers a competitive salary and focus on ways to improve on the current public education system.
As always, I welcome your comments and concerns about state government. Please feel free to contact me by writing to Senator Charles Wyrick at the State Capitol, Room 523, Oklahoma City, OK, 73105, call me at (405) 521-5561 or email me at wyrick@oksenate.gov.
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