Supporters, critics of private school voucher program react to NCGA funding

Last week, the North Carolina General Assembly passed a bill that will fully fund the waitlist of students for private school vouchers. The bill allocates $463,460,000 to an estimated 54,800 students.

North Carolina’s Opportunity Scholarship directly provides eligible families a voucher to cover the costs of having their children attend private school. In 2023, the NCGA voted to remove income-based restrictions on the program, thus expanding the program and creating a waitlist across the state. 

During the summer session, the NCGA failed to pass a budget adjustment for the 2024-25 fiscal year. As a result, the state has been operating with the budget from 2023. 

The recently passed legislation, House Bill 10, functions as a small budget adjustment, North Carolina Sen. Graig Meyer (D- Caswell, Orange, Person) said. 

“This budget proposal — like too many previous budget proposals — reveals a legislature embracing the wrong priorities” wrote the North Carolina Justice Center in a statement released on Monday.

Parents for Educational Freedom in North Carolina Executive Vice President Brian Jodice said he felt the voucher expansion was overdue.

Jodice said that the program creates opportunities for low-income families who would not otherwise be able to afford private school.

“We're excited that our state legislature, quite frankly, has shown an interest in investing in students over systems,” Jodice said. “We welcome the growth and look forward to more growth in the future.”

While supporters of the voucher program welcome the idea of expanding school choice initiatives in North Carolina, many opponents of the program believe that school vouchers undermine the already struggling public school systems across the state. 

The Supreme Court of North Carolina’s 1997 decision in Leandro v. State affirmed that every child in North Carolina has a right to a sound basic education under the state constitution. The court ordered the NCGA to fully fund public schools in North Carolina to ensure students across the state have access to their constitutional educational rights — the plan remains unfunded. 

North Carolina Supreme Court rulings in 2015 and 2018 found that North Carolina has failed to meet these standards since the ruling was decided.

Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board Chair George Griffin said the bill is a continuation of the General Assembly’s ongoing efforts to defund public education.

“The state of North Carolina has the money to support public education, but instead of using it for that, they've decided to allow parents to get the so-called school voucher for private schools,” Griffin said.

CHCCS called on the General Assembly to increase teacher salaries and pause taxpayer-funded private school vouchers until public schools are fully funded in a statement made in July. 

Gov. Roy Cooper said in a press release that increased funding for voucher programs would be disastrous for public schools.

Private schools in North Carolina are not subject to the same requirements as public schools. They are not required to follow state curricula or graduation requirements. Additionally, they are not required to accommodate students with disabilities.

“Private schools play by a completely different set of rules than public schools do,” Griffin said.

Ryan Whalen, a high school teacher for Wake County Public Schools, said he attended private schools from kindergarten through twelfth grade. 

Whalen said he doesn’t necessarily oppose private schools as an institution, but he’s wary of the voucher program because unlike public schools, private schools aren’t required to offer education to everyone. He said that even with the vouchers, many low-income families will still struggle with affording the costs of private school. Most vouchers don’t fully cover the cost of tuition and don’t fund food or transportation, leaving a funding gap for low-income families, he said

Meyer, who voted against the bill in the Senate, said if supporters of voucher programs truly wanted to level the playing field for low-income families, the income-based restrictions to receive vouchers would not have been removed in 2023.

“Having no cap on the voucher spending blows a huge hole in the state budget,” Meyer said. “We're already projected to be at almost a deficit within two to three years, and this will accelerate that.”

Senior Policy Analyst for the North Carolina Justice Center’s Education & Law Project Kris Nordstrom said the voucher expansion primarily benefits wealthy families. 

“Instead of actually addressing the very real challenges facing our public schools, they instead are increasing expenditures for private school vouchers by half a billion dollars to benefit largely wealthy families that are already enrolled in private schools,” Nordstrom said. 

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