School voucher
A school voucher, also called an education voucher, is a certificate of government funding for students at a chosen school. Funding is usually for a particular year, term, or semester. Depending on jurisdiction, a voucher may be used for home schooling expenses or exclusively for private schools, charter schools, or publicly funded schools.
Milton Friedman argued for the modern economic concept of vouchers in the 1950s, stating that free market competition among private schools would improve schools, cost less and yield superior educational outcomes than publicly funded schools. Proponents of school vouchers, including Friedrich Hayek, also argue that voucher systems provide consumer sovereignty, thus increasing school performance and accountability. Friedman's argument has nonetheless been criticised for promoting cream-skimming among students, the random nature of lottery-style voucher allocation systems, the inherent inequality in some students having to attend less preferred schools, and the diversion of public funding away from public education.
Research on the empirical effects of school vouchers has produced mixed results. On one hand, some studies find that, after adjusting for demographic factors, private and public schools performed similarly, and that voucher programs can contribute to segregation. Other studies show that increased competition indeed leads to better educational outcomes across the board and actually reduces racial and socio-economic division.
Definition
School vouchers are often distributed to enable students to attend private schools, charter schools, and publicly funded schools. Educational subsidies can also take the form of comprise government-created bank accounts, whose funds are specifically used for educational purposes, and education tax credits.Government intervention in education typically takes two forms. The first approach is broad, comprising the institution of charter schools, magnet schools, or for-profit schools, and increasing competition. The second approach is individually focused and comprises providing subsidies or loans for individuals.
Economics
argued for the modern economic concept of vouchers in the 1950s, stating that free market competition among private schools would improve schools, cost less and yield superior educational outcomes than publicly funded schools. Further, proponents of Friedman's theory, including Friedrich Hayek, argue that voucher systems provide consumer sovereignty, thus increasing school performance and accountability. The free-market theory of school vouchers has been analogised to the competition between universities and the provision of government aid or scholarships for university students, which has arguably had a positive impact on research and teaching in higher education. Major proponents of Friedman's theory include Friedman's own non-governmental organisation EdChoice and the Sutherland Institute.Friedman's reasoning in favor of vouchers gained additional attention in 1980 with the broadcast of his ten-part television series Free to Choose and the publication of its companion book of the same name. Friedman's argument has been criticised for its implicit assumption that the prices of private schools are competitive owing to differences in teaching and administration, rather than its cream-skimming approach to selecting only students who come from wealthy or otherwise advantaged backgrounds.
In contrast, the United States's National Education Association has criticised the random nature of lottery-style voucher allocation systems, the inherent inequality in some students having to attend less preferred and less competitive schools, and the diversion of public funding away from public education, which may in turn weaken public schooling standards.
A random survey of 210 economists of the American Economic Association, found that over two-thirds support giving parents educational vouchers that can be used at government-operated or privately operated schools, particularly for low-income students or students in poorly performing schools.
Background
Governments have multiple incentives for intervention in and improvement of public education, including human capital accumulation, the promotion of societal values and norms, and positive externalities such as the reduction of crime and economic development. Families face a bundle of consumption choices that determine how much they will spend on education and private consumption, with the corresponding indifference curve representing how much education an individual will want to consume versus how much private consumption an individual will want to consume. Vouchers are thus typically instituted for two broad economic reasons: to enable consumer choice; and to increase market competition among schools.Empirical effects
Research has produced mixed results. A 2017 review of the economics literature on school vouchers concluded that "the evidence to date is not sufficient to warrant recommending that vouchers be adopted on a widespread basis; however, multiple positive findings support continued exploration". Some studies, including a 2006 United States Department of Education report, conclude that, after adjusting for demographic factors, private and public schools performed similarly. At the same time, a 2021 meta-analysis found "moderate evidence of positive achievement impacts of private school vouchers, with substantial effect heterogeneity across programs and outcome years" as well as evidence suggesting that "voucher interventions may be cost-effective even for null achievement impacts."Other studies suggest that voucher programs can contribute to segregation and lack accountability for taxpayer funds. Nonetheless, other research has also shown that under certain circumstances, income and racial segregation can be reduced indirectly by increasing school choice. Additionally, it is possible that private school vouchers may offset the overall budget by way of public school cost savings from lower enrollments. Resulting job losses in the public sector may also, potentially, be offset by the increased demand for jobs in the private sector.
A 2018 study by Abdulkadiroğlu et al. found that disadvantaged students who won a lottery to get vouchers to attend private schools had worse education outcomes than disadvantaged students who did not win vouchers.
Colombia
Studies of Colombia's PACES voucher program indicate the program increased private school attendance and academic outcomes. After three years, lottery winners were 15 percentage points more likely to attend private schools, completed 0.1 more years of schooling on average, and were 10 percentage points more likely to complete eighth grade. Test scores for voucher recipients were 0.2 standard deviations higher than non-recipients, with stronger effects in mathematics for boys compared to girls. The program had no significant effect on dropout rates but was associated with reduced teenage employment and lower likelihood of early marriage or cohabitation among lottery winners.Sweden
A 2004 study found that competition from independent schools improved public school performance. However, Sweden's PISA rankings declined in the 2000s, though some attribute this to factors unrelated to the voucher system. A 2015 study reported that a higher share of independent school students correlated with improved educational outcomes, largely due to increased competition. According to Susanne Wiborg, Sweden's voucher system introduced in 1992 has "augmented social and ethnic segregation, particularly in relation to schools in deprived areas".United States
A 2003 study by the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research concludes that public schools located near private schools that were eligible to accept voucher students made significantly more improvements, including in academic test scores, than similar schools not located near eligible private schools. Caroline Hoxby studied the effects of vouchers in Milwaukee and of charter schools in Arizona and Michigan on nearby public schools, finding that public schools forced to compete made greater test-score gains than schools not faced with such competition, and that the so-called effect of cream skimming did not exist in any of the voucher districts examined.A CATO Institute study of public and private school per pupil spending in Phoenix, Los Angeles, D.C., Chicago, New York City, and Houston found that public schools spend 93% more than the estimated median private schools.
A 2013 study of Milwaukee's Parental Choice Program, which funds vouchers for both religious and nonreligious private institutions, posited that the use of vouchers increased the probability that a student would graduate from high school, go to college, and stay in college. A 2015 paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that participation in Louisiana's voucher program "substantially reduces academic achievement", which may reflect the poor quality of private schools in the program. A 2014 analysis of the competitive effects of school vouchers in Florida suggests that more competition improves performance in regular public schools.
Historically, data suggests that voucher programs have been used to further segregate Americans. Further, some data has shown that the effects of voucher programs such as the New York City School Choice Scholarship Program, are marginal when it comes to increasing student achievement.
History
When France lost the Franco-Prussian War many blamed the loss on its inferior military education system. Following this defeat, the French Assembly proposed a voucher that they hoped would improve schools by allowing students to seek out the best. This proposal never moved forward due to the reluctance of the French to subsidize religious education. Despite its failure, this proposal closely resembles voucher systems proposed or used in many modern countries.The oldest extant school voucher programs in the United States are the Town Tuitioning programs in Vermont and Maine, respectively beginning in 1869 and 1873. Because some towns in these states operate neither local high schools nor elementary schools, vouchers provide for students in these towns to attend either public schools in other towns or secular private schools.
A system of educational vouchers was introduced in the Netherlands in 1917., more than 70% of pupils attend privately run but publicly funded schools, mostly split along denominational lines.
In some Southern states during the 1960s, school vouchers were used as a way to perpetuate segregation. In a few instances, public schools were closed outright and vouchers were issued to parents. Many of the vouchers were only good at new, private and segregated schools, known as segregation academies.