Educate Oklahoma: School Vouchers

This past year, the Oklahoma Legislature came closer than ever to creating "education savings accounts" or what critics simply call -- school vouchers.

Next year, the Legislature will almost certainly try again.

The public school budget crisis, with fewer teachers and more students, is driving at least some interest in private education.

In Owasso, Rejoice Christian School just opened a new larger high school with a waiting list?

"We do get word every now and then of families that come and say we heard there would be 32 kids in my child's class and we didn't want that many, so we came over here," said school superintendent Craig Shaw.

Oklahoma's legislature has considered addressing some of that interest with public dollars, allowing parents to use a portion of what's spent in public schools, to instead choose a private education.

The champion of that cause is outgoing state Rep. Jason Nelson.

"I have every reason to believe there will be multiple versions of Education Savings Accounts filed next session," Nelson said.

Last year, 28,000 Oklahoma students attended private schools, divided between the 130 schools with state accreditation.

The median tuition was $6,900, and 25 percent of students received financial aid.

Nelson believes school choice isn't practical for most parents without a voucher. 

"If there's a more efficient way to allocate resources to educate individual children, we should do it," Nelson said.

"This is definitely not the time to be finding new ways to divert money outside of schools," said Gene Perry, Legislative analyst with the Oklahoma Policy Institute.   

Perry believes it's a false argument that even partial vouchers wouldn't undermine the larger education system, where most students would remain.

"Taking one kid out of a classroom in a public school doesn't save money for the first thing.  You still have all the infrastructure cost and all the salary costs," Perry said.