A group of Tennessee parents sued the state over its universal private school voucher program.
This year, Tennessee implemented a voucher program that gives students $7,295 to attend a private school of their choice, following the passage of the Tennessee Education Freedom Act in January.
The new program received nearly 43,000 applications from students across 91 percent of the state’s counties.
In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs alleged the new school choice program violated the Tennessee Constitution’s Education Clause. They alleged the clause does not allow “the Legislature to fund private schools outside the public school system.”
Also, the plaintiff said the clause required the Legislature to “maintain and support a public school system” that gives students a chance to receive a quality education. They claimed the poor academic outcomes for students already showed Tennessee “was already failing to provide sufficient funding.”
With the new program, it lessens “funding for public schools below this already inadequate level, thus depriving students of the resources to ensure the adequate educational opportunities guaranteed by the Tennessee Constitution,” the plaintiffs said.
The lawsuit stated the new school choice program will cost $1 billion to operate during its first five years. Furthermore, the program could fund as many as 100,000 school vouchers by 2041, the lawsuit noted.
The plaintiffs argued that the voucher program will divert millions of dollars from the public school education system, leave public schools with students with higher needs and greater expense to educate, and pay fixed costs.
Another concern the plaintiffs had was that voucher schools do not have to follow the same anti-discrimination laws as public schools. The voucher schools can “refuse admission or continued enrollment, or otherwise discriminate, based on students’ or families’ disability status, religious beliefs, language proficiency, family income, gender identity, sexual orientation, academic ability, or other factors.”
The plaintiffs said public schools have to “admit all students.” They added that the new program does not include any provisions that prevent taxpayer funds from supporting “discriminatory policies and practices by voucher schools or other private education providers.”
In this case, the plaintiffs are asking a judge to declare the program unconstitutional and to block its implementation.
They are represented by the ACLU of Tennessee, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Education Law Center, and the Southern Education Foundation.
Crystal Boehm, who is one of the plaintiffs and a teacher, said, “They call this ‘school choice,’ but the choice isn’t yours, it’s the private school’s.”
“They can reject your child for a disability, for your family’s religion, for any reason at all. Meanwhile, public schools that educate everyone are losing the funding they need,” she added.
Lucas Cameron-Vaughn, an ACLU attorney, said the state Constitution “is clear: the state must maintain and support a system of free public schools.”
“This voucher scheme does the opposite,” he stated. “It siphons desperately needed resources away from public schools that serve all students and hands that money to private schools with no accountability, no transparency, and no obligation to serve every child.”
The plaintiffs filed the lawsuit in Davidson County Chancery Court.
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Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network. Email tips to Zachery at zschmidt1717@gmail.com.|
