This commentary is by Vaughn Altemus of Williston, who retired from the Vermont Agency of Education after spending 19 years on the finance team. Part of the time he was assigned to assist school boards considering governance changes.
Public education in Vermont faces a threat without precedent. In June 2020, the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Espinoza v. Montana expanded the obligation to provide public funding to religious schools.
However, as Justice Roberts’ wrote in the majority opinion, “A State need not subsidize private education. But once a State decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.”
That acknowledgment that states don’t have to fund private schools is the slender reed that now protects public education. That slender reed also preserves the right of states to prevent discrimination. The reed is slender because the appointment of Amy Coney Barrett to the court makes the vote of John Roberts unnecessary to form a majority.
Vermont statute allows school districts that don’t operate public schools to pay tuition vouchers to loosely regulated private schools. Consequently, federal appellate courts have ordered Vermont districts to pay vouchers to religious schools as well.
The Vermont Senate’s response has been to impose a few requirements to provide guardrails. If schools don’t require attendance at worship services and find some other reason for not hiring LGBTQ persons or excluding the children of LGTBQ parents, the Senate expects things to be fine. The Senate believes students in voucher districts will have a few more choices.
The critical point the choice lobby is at pains to obfuscate is that the decision is a district choice, not a parental choice. Districts can designate up to three schools (public or private) to serve as the public schools for their children (although private schools are not obligated to accept designation) or they can permit wider choice.
I worked with school boards throughout the state for many years as they examined their governance structures. The loving care with which school boards struggle to provide for their students makes it painful to read John McClaughry’s assertion that the education provided under the supervision of these boards complies with the dictates of some out-of-state conspiracy.
His reference to the power of the “VT government school lobby” begs for comparison with the millions of dollars spent nationally every year to lobby for universal choice and the privatization of schools.
Vouchers have largely flown under the radar for most voters, because most voters live in communities operating public schools. But numerous cases intended to expand choice, at least three in Vermont, are now working their way through the courts. One seeks to mandate access to private schools in all districts — a gross undermining of local voice. Victory would mean vouchers in every district.
And now voucher programs must include religious schools, and it’s less and less clear states can have a say over what happens in religious schools. A Maine case related to whether Maine can regulate payment of vouchers to religious schools, Carson v. Makin, has reached the Supreme Court. A similar Vermont case is in litigation, under preliminary injunction, until an opinion is issued in the Maine case. The decision may have profound implications for Vermont.
Does it matter? We are assured that individual parents choosing the best schools, public or private, for their students will produce the best education for Vermont’s children. And competition with private schools will force public schools to become less expensive and to deliver education that more closely mirrors the desires of parents.
The argument is flawed. To assess the impact of students leaving a school district, it is important to understand the difference between average cost and marginal cost. If a district has 100 students and spends $1,500,000 educating them, the average cost to educate a student is $15,000.
Far more relevant is the cost of losing or gaining one more student. How much does a district save if one student leaves? It will heat the same buildings, employ the same teachers and staff, maintain the same computing and accounting systems. A school losing a handful of students saves virtually nothing but does generate a higher tax rate. The converse is true for a district or independent school gaining one student.
Imagine this school losing five students upon the arrival of universal choice. Maybe some meager savings can be realized. Assuming the students attend an independent school with a modest tuition of $12,000, the cost to the district is $60,000. So, a cost of $60,000 and savings of virtually nothing.
It gets worse. Under the invisible hand theory of school choice, the district is expected to make itself more attractive to increase enrollment. Will it raise salaries to attract more high-quality teachers? Will it introduce an exciting new program? Maybe it will decrease class sizes to compete with private schools with lower ratios.
People would be wise to consider the impact of competition on the cost of higher education over recent years.
Almost certainly a district with declining enrollment caused by universal choice will do the same as districts with declining enrollment caused by a shrinking student population: defer maintenance and cut programs. It is important to recognize the threat that universal choice presents to public education.
If a school has 50 students enrolled and five decide to leave, it is retaining 90%. How many more will follow when the funding cuts become apparent?
Sadly, universal choice transforms public education from a system of shared governance, where communities strive to provide excellent education for all students, to a system of individual decisions, in which families are forced to fight for access, with the most well off doing best.
The more we privatize expensive essential services like education, the more it becomes like health care and child care: expensive, low wage and inequitable.
In a privatized world of education, the options available to parents will be neither fair nor equitable. It also won’t be affordable. A few guardrails will provide nothing but a thin veneer to appease the consciences of the well-to-do. Working-class families may have no choice at all, or choices in less well-funded schools. If a school closes, the “choice” may be to find any school within reach.
The wealthy can take their vouchers anywhere they wish, paying additional tuition if it strikes their fancy.
The late Bob Fingon, for many years business manager for the Rutland City district, tracked the reasons students transferred to the district. Number 1 was Division 1 sports. Number 2 was convenience for parents working in Rutland. If ever there were a reason to destroy the civic culture of a small town, Division 1 sports would be it.
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