Ryan D. Jayne, FFRF Action Fund’s senior policy counsel, has written an op-ed for a leading Ohio newspaper cogently explaining why the state should be ending its voucher schemes.
Jayne’s piece was published in the Martins Ferry Times Leader in the wake of the Ohio Legislature giving the go-ahead to a huge expansion of school voucher programs. He patiently lays out, point by point, why lawmakers should instead be shuttering these.
Jayne writes:
Under the proposed deal, taxpayer-funded vouchers will become nearly universal, with families earning up to 450 percent of the federal poverty line ($135,000 for a family of four) qualifying for full scholarships. And even the wealthiest families in Ohio, and those who already send their children to private schools, will be eligible to receive some level of scholarship. The current program already costs nearly $700 million over the next two years, and it’s unclear how much more it will cost after this expansion.
Ohioans should carefully consider whether these programs have benefited students. Here are a few key facts to keep in mind.
Jayne then engages in a deft demolition of voucher schemes.
“The lesson is clear: Vouchers are a failed experiment,” the op-ed concludes. “Ohioans should demand that voucher programs be ended, rather than expanded, and then engage the question of how best to improve public schools with the additional funding available.”
Read the full article online here to absorb Jayne’s astute analysis and share it on your social media.
This column is a part of the Freedom From Religion Foundation Action Fund’s initiative to engage with pertinent issues at the national and the state levels and spread the messages of freethought and nontheism to a mainstream audience.
FFRF Action Fund is the lobbying arm of the The Freedom From Religion Foundation, a national nonprofit organization with more than 40,000 members and several chapters across the country, including over 1,000 members and three chapters in Ohio.
