The head of one of Pennsylvania’s teachers’ unions said Friday that a tuition voucher program proposed by Senate Republicans is not responsible governing.
Rich Askey, president of PSEA, said that while Senate Republicans have made a “lifeline scholarship” tuition voucher proposal a top priority in stat budget negotiation, the measure is “irresponsible and unacceptable,” and will not become law if anti-voucher lawmakers in the House continue to oppose it.
“PSEA is absolutely opposed to ‘lifeline scholarships’ or any other tuition voucher scheme,” Askey said. “We disagree with Gov. (Josh) Shapiro and Sec. (Khalid) Mumin on lifeline scholarships, and we’ve made that clear to them. We are incredibly disappointed that Sec. Mumin has suggested that Gov. Shapiro could be the first governor in Pennsylvania history to sign a school voucher bill.”
Lifeline Scholarships would give students in “low-achieving school districts” (defined as “a public school that ranked in the lowest 15 percent on math and reading”) a scholarship to use on educational expenses, including tuition at private schools.
In a letter last week to Shapiro, Mumin and legislators, several unions said they oppose “lifeline scholarship programs” or any other voucher program that diverts tax payer dollars away from private schools.
“Pennsylvania has a moral and constitutional responsibility to fund its existing system of public education. Consideration of a tuition voucher program would flagrantly disregard the direction of the Commonwealth Court in William Penn School District et al. v. Pa. Department of Education et al,” the groups said in their letter. “Therefore, it is clearly irresponsible to appropriate state funds for tuition vouchers that benefit private and religious schools when the commonwealth hasn’t met its most basic duty to students who attend our public schools – the same public schools that the Commonwealth Court has determined are unconstitutionally underfunded.”
Askey said the key to defeating the bill was votes against it by legislators who have traditionally opposed “voucher schemes.”
“A large group of lawmakers in the House has voted against voucher schemes like this in the past,” Askey said. “With their support and clear opposition to ‘lifeline scholarships,’ we can stop this terrible idea and together focus on fixing our unconstitutional public school funding system.”