(updated on Nov. 4 with link to SCOTUSblog podcast)
The National School Boards Association (NSBA) is urging the U.S. Supreme Court to declare unconstitutional an Arizona school scholarship program that grants donors state income tax breaks for providing tuition for children to attend private, predominantly religious schools
The high court heard oral arguments in the case, Winn v. Christian School Tuition Organization, on Nov. 3. NSBA has filed an amicus brief on behalf plaintiffs challenging the program, which funnels millions of dollars to private schools without public accountability.
“It is bad public policy to support voucher programs, like Arizona’s, that divert public money away from public schools where a vast majority of children are educated,” said NSBA Executive Director Anne L. Bryant.
In the amicus brief, attorneys for NSBA argued that the program “appears to have the effect and purpose of advancing religion.”
“The program’s ostensible educational purposes are a sham,” the brief says. “Unlike some other school choice programs, it does not provide free choice among public, secular private and religiously affiliated schools, and does not assist low-income or educationally disadvantaged students.”
NSBA General Counsel Francisco M. Negron Jr. appeared in a podcast for SCOTUSblog to further explain the argument taken by the public school advocates. Listen to the podcast here.
The brief noted that most of the students in the program had been attending private schools before receiving scholarships and that the program was too small to give public school parents the financial support to send their children to private schools.
Joining NSBA in the amicus brief were the Arizona School Boards Association, the American Association of School Administrators, the National Education Association, and the Arizona Education Association.
