Private School Vouchers in New Orleans
By: Jill Zimmerman | March 28, 2011
The Student Scholarships for Education Excellence Program, a state-funded school voucher program in New Orleans, is about to conclude its third year in operation. The program was created in 2008 to offer low-income students in Orleans Parish an alternative to attending a failing public school by providing a scholarship to attend a participating private or parochial school. The program began by serving grades K-3 and added a grade each year, and it currently serves about 1,700 students in grades K-5. The scholarship, or voucher, is equal to 90 percent of the total state and local funding per student (about $7,500 in 2011) or the private school’s tuition and fees, whichever is smaller. Last year the average voucher was worth about $4,100. Though the number of participants remains fairly small in New Orleans, voucher programs have drawn scrutiny both nationally and in New Orleans because they take money away from the public schools or other state programs.
Funding for the New Orleans voucher program is included in the Recovery School District (RSD) budget and must be approved by the Louisiana Legislature each year. Governor Jindal recently included a 15 percent increase in funding for the voucher program in his 2012 state budget plan. Additionally, Jindal supported the third year in a row of flat-funding for public schools.
Since its inception, funding for the voucher program has ranged from $6 to $10 million. In the voucher program’s first year, the state allocated about $10 million for the voucher program but spent only $2.7 million on the approximately 650 students who participated. $6 million was allocated the following year but only $4.9 million was spent on approximately 1,200 students. The state allocated about $8.7 million for the current school year, and Jindal’s funding increase would bring the voucher program’s allocation to $10 million next year. Assuming the program continues to expand each year, private school vouchers could cost the state as much as $67 million over the next five years.
Despite continued investment at the state level, standardized test scores of students participating in the program have yet to demonstrate any measurable success. According to a report by Educate Now, students participating in the voucher program last year performed much worse than students at both RSD charter and RSD direct-run schools in New Orleans. Of the 240 voucher students who took the state’s 3rd and 4th grade English Language Arts iLEAP test, 65 percent of 3rd grade students and 72 percent of 4th grade students scored below grade level, compared with 51 percent and 52 percent in the RSD, respectively. Results on the other subject tests were similar. (Click here to view all test results, compiled by Educate Now.) Though only a small percentage of students in the voucher program are included in these test results, these preliminary figures are quite disconcerting.
With an extremely tight state budget, there are difficult decisions to be made about how to utilize limited public education dollars. There are a number of public education initiatives or programs that have been proven to be effective and could greatly benefit from a funding boost. For example, many New Orleans area pre-kindergarten programs have been forced to reduce enrollment, charge tuition, or close altogether due to limited funding for the state’s LA 4 early childhood education program. The LA 4 program provides $4,550 per pupil to schools enrolling low-income students in pre-kindergarten, almost the exact same amount as the average private school voucher. Another example is the widely hailed Teacher Advancement Program (TAP), which utilizes value-added data to guide professional development and improve teacher effectiveness, and which currently exists in only 75 schools state-wide. The average per-pupil cost of implementing TAP is only $450, meaning next year’s $10 million budget allocation for the voucher program could pay for the expansion of TAP to about 30-45 additional schools.
In recent years, Louisiana has made a concerted effort to invest in and commit to improving its public schools. It is critical that we continue to evaluate our investments and prioritize those education programs and initiatives that are proven to be effective at improving student outcomes.
6 Comments
I AM SEEKING INFORMATION OF VOUCHERS FOR PRIVATE SCHOOL IN NEW ORLEANS FOR MY 6TH GRADER. MY SON WILL BE IN THE 6TH GRADE FOR THE 2012 SCHOOL YEAR AND IS INTERESTED IN ATTENDING ST. AUGUSTINE HIGH SCHOOL. PLEASE CONTACT ME WITH ANY INFORMATION THAT WOULD HELP US.
SINCERELY,
MS. DEON LEE
I am seeking information about the voucher program for my son whom is 4 years old he was unable to attend Headstart due to the waiting list an my income I am a working single mom who cannot afford daycare an would like to get some information how to apply for these grants such as the K4 please contact me with any information that would help me it would truly be appeciated.
Thanks,
Okisha Butler
Deon,
You can find more information about the New Orleans voucher program on the Louisiana Department of Education website: http://www.doe.state.la.us/topics/scholarships_for_excellence.html. On that page you will find eligibility requirements for students and families seeking a voucher, as well as a list of the participating private schools. St. Augustine has not participated in the past.
The Urban League recently produced a new guide to high schools in New Orleans that you may find helpful. It includes information about public, private, and parochial schools in the city. You can download it here: http://www.urbanleagueneworleans.org/centers-of-excellence/education-and-youth-development/parent-information-center.
Best of luck.
Okisha,
There is a good amount of information about private school vouchers available on the Louisiana Department of Education’s website here: http://www.doe.state.la.us/topics/scholarships_for_excellence.html. While you should contact the LDOE directly for more information, my understanding is that the voucher program begins in kindergarten and does not accept pre-k students. However, many public schools in New Orleans offer free pre-k programs. The New Orleans Parents’ Guide for Public Schools is a fantastic resource on public schools in New Orleans, available here: http://www.nolapon.org/. Organizations like the Urban League and the Mahalia Jackson Early Childhood and Family Learning Center will likely be able to provide you with more information as well. Best of luck and I hope you are able to find a good option for your son.
As an Institute affiliated with a university, you should have someone on staff with statistical savvy go over your articles so that incorrect claims like the following aren’t made:
“Despite continued investment at the state level, standardized test scores of students participating in the program have yet to demonstrate any measurable success. ”
This is completely unjustified. You simply cannot analyze the “success” or non-success of vouchers by looking at the passage rates on state standardized tests. At a minimum, you’d have to have before and after test scores for the voucher students; better yet, you’d have before and after scores for a comparable group of public school children; better yet, you’d be able to point to a randomized assignment of vouchers, such as was done in D.C. (where voucher recipients had a huge increase in the chance of graduating from high school).
Professor Buck,
Thank you for your thoughtful comments. Your point is well taken. Based on the limited data available (standardized test scores of both voucher recipients and students at the failing schools the voucher recipients otherwise would have attended), it is not clear that the students participating in the voucher program are performing better than their RSD peers on the state’s standardized tests. We point this out in our more recent report on the voucher pilot program in New Orleans, available here: http://www.coweninstitute.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Private-Schools-and-Choice-April-20121.pdf. The available test score data is discouraging, with voucher recipients at some schools performing worse than their peers at the lowest-performing schools in New Orleans. However, I think it is clear that to truly understand the impact of the voucher program – and, for that matter, all school choice programs – we need far more information than is available to us here in Louisiana. The Cowen Institute is actively working to better understand school choice through parent surveys, parent and student focus groups, and analysis of the available choice and enrollment data, which we hope will provide more clarity.