EdChoice Voucher Program Grows
Despite Governor Strickland's promise to end the EdChoice voucher program, the number of parents across the state who have applied for the right to choose the best school for their children has more than doubled from the first year. Last year, 3,667 parents applied for a voucher under the program.
This year, in just the first enrollment period, the Ohio Department of Education has reported receiving 7,957 applications -- an increase of 117 percent. If the governor had hoped that his rhetoric would cool the desire of parents to seek a voucher for their children, the enrollment numbers suggest he failed.
Because the pool of eligible parents was expanded earlier this year, it is difficult to make accurate comparisons to enrollment rates in other voucher programs. The substantial expansion of eligible students has meant that applications as a percentage of all eligible students have gone down, even as the total number of applicants has gone up.
However, the experience in Cleveland does provide a helpful comparison for putting the EdChoice enrollment trend in context. As the Cleveland program entered the second year, its future too was under a cloud of uncertainty, although from litigation rather than political posturing. The increase in the number of families applying for an EdChoice voucher is rather remarkable when viewed in the context of the early Cleveland program years.
In the first year of the Cleveland program, 7.3 percent of eligible families enrolled, meaning that there were still plenty of vouchers available in the second year. But the ongoing court battle, and the relative newness of school vouchers in general, no doubt made parents leery of the prospect of entering the program only to see their child sent right back to the failing public schools a year or two later. Between the first and second year, the number of parents enrolling their children in the voucher program only increased by about 12 percent, from 1,994 to roughly 2,240.
Parents eligible to enroll their students in the EdChoice program clearly have not felt the same unease as those in the early years of the Cleveland program. Not swayed by the pronouncements of the governor and others who have opposed the program, including a local school district that tried to keep parents in the dark about their eligibility, enrollment has been robust in the second year.
The governor has stated that he believes the "EdChoice is in its infancy and is easier to cut." Parents from across the state have clearly responded to the governor's challenge with a challenge of their own. In only its second year, the EdChoice program is well over half its capacity of 14,000 total vouchers available. It may be young, but cutting it will mean trying to explain to almost 8,000 parents why sending their children back to a failing school is good policy.
It's difficult to deny parents the freedom of educational choice once they've had a taste. As one Madisonville parent put it: "You feed somebody filet mignon for an entire year and now you tell them they have to go back to eating Spam? I just can't see my kids going back into Cincinnati Public.
Opponents of the EdChoice program have yet to present a compelling argument as to why parents should not be given the opportunity to choose the school that is best for their children. That the second year applications, in just the first enrollment period, have increased by 117 percent provides ample evidence that parents aren't buying these arguments either.
