As an education researcher, the data show school vouchers would harm Tennessee students

Gov. Bill Lee’s new plans to expand Tennessee’s existing school voucher program would amount to doubling down on a policy that has failed kids and parents horribly in other states.

I should know. I’ve been studying these voucher systems both as an outside expert and on behalf of state agencies elsewhere for the last 18 years.

When I started as a young researcher, I was cautiously optimistic that these schemes could help provide new educational opportunities.

But the data are in and have been for years now: the larger and more recent the voucher system, the worse the results.

Here's who actually benefits from school voucher programs

First, let’s be clear about who does benefit when states expand their voucher systems, as Gov. Lee is proposing. Just this year, reports from all over the country have shown that after bills backed by billionaires like former U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos have passed other state legislatures, roughly 70% of new voucher users had been already in private school beforehand.

Whatever the rhetoric about “education freedom” says, the reality is that voucher eligibility does not mean voucher access. Parents can only spend their voucher at schools that will accept their children. Private schools find many ways to turn voucher-holding kids and their families away. That’s because when it comes to vouchers, it’s not actually about what parents choose. Vouchers are the school’s choice, not school choice.

What about the 25% or so of kids who do transfer to private schools? For them, vouchers can have nothing short of catastrophic academic consequences. In the four states since 2013 to allow full independent review of their voucher programs — Indiana, Louisiana, Ohio and Washington, D.C. — scholars have found some of the largest negative results ever seen in education research.

How large? As much as and up to double what COVID-19 did to test scores.

The reason is that when new students do get admitted, it’s often to sub-prime private schools—either existing, financially distressed schools or pop-up providers looking to cash in on the new revenue from taxpayers. High quality, elite private providers like the kind you see in some cities and leafy suburbs do exist, but for the most part want nothing to do with voucher plans. They don’t need the money.

More: Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee's statewide school voucher pitch: Here's what to know

Tennessee has been successful on education, but more vouchers would do the state any favors

You don’t have to take my word for that — organizations like Betsy DeVos’s voucher advocacy group are quietly mustering existing Catholic and other religious school parents to back vouchers as a way of “saving” those private schools. And with new taxpayer subsidies in hand, many private schools simply raise tuition to top revenue off even further.

Even those bailouts don’t always work. Many struggling private schools close anyway. In Wisconsin, 40% of private schools have closed since taking voucher payments. And that’s a problem because it’s just one more way that vouchers fail the basic promise of new opportunity their advocates offer.

Writing from afar, I’m especially concerned about the voucher scheme in Tennessee because — for all the real shortcomings that can exist in some public schools — the state has an enviable record of public education successes. Researchers like me often look to Tennessee for innovative new ideas.

But on vouchers, Tennesseans should look to other states and see the warning: from broken budgets to record-low academic failures, the damage is already being done.

Joshua M. Cowen, Ph.D., is professor of education policy at the College of Education at Michigan State University.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: School vouchers would harm Tennessee students; here's what data says