When we let vouchers drain our schools, it hurts us all.
March 18, 2026
It is sad to see what is happening in Ohio and across our country regarding the growing problem with states using public tax dollars to openly fund private, most often, religious education.
In state after state where programs like Ohio’s universal private school voucher program known as EdChoice has been pushed upon the public, there have been scandals, outrage and backlash.
In Florida and Texas, state lawmakers have pushed for giving public tax dollars to religious schools, as long as they approve of the religion.
Now they are facing backlash for excluding Islamic schools from applying for vouchers.
Texas, Florida face pushback over efforts to exclude Islamic schools from school voucher programs
Our lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the harmful $1.7 billion private school maintains no private, religious school should receive tax dollars because public dollars are for public schools, period.
In Arizona, reporters found voucher money was used to buy diamond rings and necklaces, appliances, lingerie, IPhones, smart TVs, and gift cards.
We don’t know how the $1.7 billion going to private schools is being spent because there is zero financial or academic accountability for EdChoice. Zero.
At the same time, Arizona’s public schools are suffering and a judge ruled in August the funding system was unconstitutional. The ruling included photos of damaged roofs, cracked floors, and peeling walls, and cited teachers using their own money for school supplies while vouchers spending rose to more than $1 billion.
Our lawsuit makes the same point. Ohio lawmakers and Gov. DeWine are shortchanging the Cupp Patterson Fair School Funding Plan devised to address Ohio’s unconstitutional public school formula while giving voucher schools $1.7 billion, mostly for wealthy families whose children were already enrolled in private schools.
In Ohio, the top issue at the gathering of the Ohio School Boards Association last November was vouchers.
Denis Smith, a retired school administrator who served as a consultant in the Ohio Department of Education’s charter school office, wrote following the OSBA meeting:
“The top issue facing Ohio schools isn’t a shortage of bus drivers, scarce substitute teachers, or funding for aging school buses. It’s the expanded universal private school voucher program that is devastating the long-range viability of public education and diverting more than $1 billion annually from the state treasury to support private and religious schools.”
Ohio School Boards Association conference reveals growing reaction against vouchers and lawmakers
The good news is public schools and their supporters are fighting back in each of these states, and winning in court cases like we have so far with a ruling in June, 2025 by Franklin Common Pleas Judge Jaiza Page that EdChoice Vouchers are unconstitutional on three counts.
Is your district part of our historic lawsuit? Check here.
If not, why not? Learn more here.