Support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio comes from Medical mutual providing more than 1.4 million Ohioans peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at med mutual dot com slash Ohio by the law offices of Porter Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP.

Now with eight locations across the country.

Porter Wright is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community.

Maude Porter Wright dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at OHEA.org.

The Ohio Redistricting Commission gets to work, setting the foundation for its final maps on Republican drawn districts and another view of the expansion of the state's main school voucher program and the lawsuit over taxpayer money for private school tuition.

From a supporter of school choice all this weekend, the state of Ohio.

Welcome to the state of ohio.

I'm Karen councilor.

After delaying work for a week while republicans fought over leadership of the ohio redistricting commission, that panel met and adopted working maps that favor majority republicans.

Though Republican co-chair was finally selected in auditor Keith Faber, the meeting had a rocky start.

Governor Mike DeWine had to sit remotely after testing positive for COVID and Republican and Democratic commissioners could not agree on the rules that the panel would follow going forward.

The commission's two Democrats proposed their maps and then the Republicans brought forward their plans.

The five Republicans on the commission adopted the GOP drawn maps as the ones to base their final maps on.

But there are questions about the data that was used to draw up those maps.

I think it's a discussion to be had and that's why I identified it as an area for us to be prepared to discuss.

And I think it has to start with whether or not the data is available.

We have to work with the data that's available.

I think the election data is available.

Mike DeWine got over 60% of the vote.

And the other numbers that are included in there as well.

Were all the numbers changed since the last maps that were drawn?

Again, I don't have a solid number.

I think it's higher than that.

I think it's I think it's in the it's considerably higher than that.

So obviously, we have a disagreement about whether about what the number is.

Leader Russo has indicated that is 5643 based on the information we have.

Obviously, at some point we're going to have to agree on what data we're using.

Again, I think there's also an argument that you don't get to the magical mystery ratio depending on how you draw the rest of the maps.

The working maps will be discussed in a quick set of public hearings with locations proposed by Republicans, which Democrats said largely left out urban voters.

The panel met Friday morning at Deer Creek State Park in south central Ohio.

The commission meets Monday at 10 a.m. at Ponders and State Park and Java County Tuesday at 10 a.m. in the Senate Finance hearing room in the state House.

Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose, who is also on the commission, had said maps should be adopted by Friday, but they must be approved by October 23rd for the March primaries to go forward as scheduled.

Applications for the newly expanded ed Choice taxpayer paid school voucher program keep flooding in ahead of the deadline October 15th.

As of this week, the established ed choice program has received 41,891 applications and the ED Choice expansion has received 78,161 applications.

Nearly 54,000 of those have come in since July, when the new state budget extended taxpayer paid vouchers to any family who wants them, including families already sending their kids to private schools without vouchers and families who have never sent their kids to public school.

They're worth as much as $6,165 for kids up to eighth grade and $8,407 for high school students.

Families making more than 450% of the federal poverty level, or $135,000 a year for a family of four would get less money.

That was estimated to cost the state $397.8 million in the first year of the budget and $439.1 million in the second.

It's predicted nearly 130,000 kids could have ed choice vouchers by next year.

57% more than the total number of kids in all five of the state's voucher programs right now.

Those five voucher programs are estimated to cost the state more than $1,000,000,000 a year by fiscal year 2025.

And the numbers applying for the ED choice expansion are very likely to drive that total even higher.

Meanwhile, public school districts are suing the state over vouchers, saying they siphoned funds from constitutionally mandated public education.

I talked last week with two members of the coalition called Vouchers Hurt, Ohio University Heights, Cleveland Heights School Board Treasurer Pro-Tem Dan Hynes and Columbus Board of Education member Eric Brown.

This week I talked with Chad Aldis, vice President for Ohio Policy with the Thomas B Fordham Institute, a conservative think tank that advocates for educational policy that favors charter schools and school choice.

So let's talk a little bit about the ED Choice expansion.

It's going over well, but that could mean bad things for the state budget.

Right.

Well, and, you know, that's when the numbers come in later this fall.

I think we'll know a lot more.

Right now, the challenge is in determining estimates how many students were already in a private school and now have some financial help and support to sort of pay those costs.

And how many are transferring from a traditional public school?

And where are they in terms of income?

And so so just how large a voucher will these students beginning?

And I think that is the big question mark right now that everybody is sort of.

Well, right now, we're still scratching your head until the data comes in.

The estimates for how much this program would cost are going to be blown by this.

I mean, the numbers are coming in.

The numbers of applications are coming in way above the estimates.

Yeah, I think so.

But I think anyone paying attention in detail would have expected all current private school students whose school was already participating in the voucher program to to sign up, put their applications in and get some level of support.

But we don't know whether that's an $800 scholarship or an $8,000 scholarship.

So, again, my guess is the estimates will be over.

But but it might not be as bad as as some prognosticators would have you believe.

Now, an analysis of what's happening with the voucher expansion program by school funding expert Howard Leder showed more than half of the new applications are people who had their children in private schools and have never had their children in public school.

So this is essentially extra state money that's going to this program that wasn't going to it before.

How is this sustainable?

Well, one of the biggest debates we've often had with private school choice programs in Ohio has been a national leader in it for more than two decades.

Is.

Who should qualify and who shouldn't.

In Cleveland, if you live in Cleveland, there was never an income requirement.

Cleveland kids the beginning of the program for for us, the beginning of private school choice programs.

Every family in Cleveland was eligible for a voucher.

And so.

But did all of them use it?

No, they didn't.

So so what we don't know really, is exactly how many families will use it.

But but the question always is how much support should and should people who are always going go to private school get.

And there are there there are at least two schools of thought on it.

One is it's a private school.

You should pay your own way.

But the other one is, look, the state requires every student in the state of Ohio to go to school.

Compulsory education laws.

And if we're doing that, shouldn't we give every family the right to pick the school that works best for their child?

And for the vast majority of students, that's always going to be their local district school.

But some might want to go to a public charter school and some might want to go to a private school.

And I think that's what we're seeing for the first time.

The state is actually putting their money behind the concept that moms and dads, you have the right to decide the school that works best for your kid.

Some of the arguments that we're also hearing on this, including from Senate President Matt Huffman, is that it's cheaper to educate a kid and give them a voucher than it is to send a kid to public school.

That's not entirely true, is it?

Well, you know, it it all depends on how you look at costs.

Those who are opposed to private school choice programs and vouchers will look at what the state pays per pupil.

But if you're a taxpayer, you really look at total taxpayer costs.

Columbus, its northwards of $15,000 per pupil per year.

If a student leaves there and goes to Bishop Hartley, they're going to get a scholarship if they get the maximum scholarship of $8,000.

So there's there's $7,000 of play there.

That in terms of taxpayers, you're spending less to educate the same kid.

But in some school districts, the amount that the state is spending is is pretty low.

Oh, well, even in Columbus, it's only around 4000.

So the question is whether the analysis is total taxpayer dollars spent, which is state and local taxpayer, state and local dollars, or whether it's just state dollars.

So the state has has kicked in more dollars.

They said, listen, we don't want to take dollars from local school districts and even we don't want to transfer them any more from local school districts.

We want to pay the entire freight of voucher programs ourselves.

And they put their money where their mouth is.

They're doing it.

The lawsuit.

Let's talk a little bit about that.

And this was a lawsuit was filed two years ago.

So this is preexisting.

The Ed Choice voucher program.

The expansion of it, it says that the voucher system, quote, poses an existential threat to Ohio's public school system.

Not only does this voucher program unconstitutionally usurp Ohio's public tax dollars to subsidize private school tuitions, it does so by depleting Ohio's foundation funding the pool of money out of which the state funds Ohio's public schools otherwise available to already struggling school districts for the education of their students.

Does it pose that existential threat?

Well, I think the legislature's proven through the last two budget cycles that it absolutely does not.

Public school choice, public schools and private school choice.

It's not a zero sum game.

It's all about what we find and what we fund our priorities.

Public schools in the state of Ohio have never been funded at a higher level in real dollars than they are now.

We have more choice than ever now, and we have better funded public schools than ever before.

And, you know, again, the end of the day, moms and dads across the state, whatever choose school they choose, can win.

It does not have to be a zero sum game If lawmakers keep funding education appropriately and and properly.

And so far, they're doing it.

Let me ask you about some comments that your colleague Aaron Churchill made in an op ed that he wrote about this lawsuit.

I for one thing, voucher opponents say that vouchers discriminate against minority students by increasing segregation.

Your colleague Aaron Churchill's claim that they have helped ease segregation and create more racially biased school districts because black students are more likely to apply for vouchers.

How does that work?

Yeah, so the study we did, a professor, Stephan Lavoie, too, from the Glenn School at Ohio State University, did did an analysis of exactly what segregation looks like over the voucher programs effect on segregation.

Voucher opponents were claiming it impacted segregation and made segregation worse.

Well, well, clearly that that threw up warning bells.

We were very concerned about it, because if that's true, it would make a lot of us who are private school choice supporters definitely take a step back and reassess.

Fortunately, when Dr. Lavoie too, looked at the numbers and looked at where districts were before the introduction of the age race program and and where they were afterward, he found that it reduced on average segregation by 10 to 15%.

Now, so why is that when it went and what are what's happening behind the scenes?

And I think what it is, is by and large, the majority of students are students of color who are using the scholarships.

But many of these districts and this is the part we don't say out loud a lot of times a lot of these districts were already segregating.

The Ed Choice program is is didn't cause the segregation.

Ohio schools and school districts have been segregating for decades.

And you can see that there.

Are by.

That what I mean is discriminate the well a lot of it has been students moving or families moving from the from the cities to suburbs.

And so that has been going on for decades.

We have a lot of the school districts surrounding the urban areas close to open enrollment.

Now, think about that for a second.

Many of these that are signed on to the lawsuit saying, you know, we don't and are claiming the Ed Choice program discriminates, have closed their borders to students, often students of color from urban areas, from coming into their districts, even if they have capacity to serve them.

Well, you know, I mean, so so public education doesn't take everybody.

And that's important to remember.

The end of the day.

I'm very comfortable with the academic rigor.

A Professor Lavoie, to study.

We'll keep evaluating those numbers.

That's a very important I'm sure the court will evaluate those numbers.

But right now, it appears that many of Ohio's school districts are very segregated.

The ED Choice program simply isn't the cause of it.

And that's what needs to be at issue when we're evaluating this program.

I should note that the people who are involved in the lawsuit claim that that study that you just mentioned is not peer reviewed and they don't believe in the academic value of that study.

Well, you know, I like that they're doing that because that's an important question.

When research is done, you should always ask who did it?

What's the rigor of this study?

But but I also noticed that they didn't bring that question up when Fordham funded a study that studied Ohio's charter school sector and found that charter schools were academically underperforming.

Nobody wanted to question the integrity of the study then.

No one no one questioned the study by David Figueiredo in 2016 about Ohio's Ed Choice voucher program that found that participants students using the voucher scored lower on state tests.

Everybody was fine with it then.

So I appreciate their concern about whether our our studies are fair, but it seems like they only have issues with them when they disagree with the findings.

Speaking of studies, going back to that one study by Howard Fleder.

It shows the percentage of low income students getting Cleveland and Ed choice vouchers has decreased significantly.

Wasn't an argument for vouchers that kids should not be trapped in failing public schools because they couldn't afford to go to private schools?

And yet it appears these voucher programs are now giving vouchers to families who can't afford to send their kids to private schools.

Yeah.

So so of course, Dr. Fleder does great work.

And what our concern, I think, was as we sort of dug into that, is is figuring out sort of some of the data sources.

We don't have good information on the on the at the the income level of students who are using some of these programs.

So we don't have a good reflection.

I would say, though, that if you think the the number of students using the Cleveland voucher program, that the Cleveland students are not poor or low income, that program has been serving the same 7 to 8000 kids all the way through the cycle forever.

The program hasn't changed.

So the idea that it's changing, I think what's happening is the data sources, the data availability, things like that are changing, which is making it appear more that numbers are in flux when in truth, there are a lot of economically challenged folks in Cleveland.

And and that has and they're being served by the by the Cleveland Scholarship program and and have been now for over two decades.

There's also the concern about transparency and accountability when it comes to the voucher program and private schools getting vouchers and which are public money.

Most private schools are religious.

They aren't subject to audits like public schools are.

Public schools cannot discriminate like private schools can, though you've made the claim that there certainly is the opportunity to discriminate if you don't have open enrollment.

Public schools say that they have students that have better test scores.

So in the wake of a scandal over the electronic classroom of tomorrow or E court, which cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars, that it still has not yet been able to recover and probably never will, I guess how can the state send money to schools that aren't open and transparent and accountable?

Yeah, well, on the econ example, it will be important to remember that was a public charter school.

So so all of those things that related to audits and test scores and things like that, we actually had those, right.

So so it is a bit of an apples and oranges thing compared to the private schools.

In terms of the audit, the very the various requirements you mentioned to participate in the private school choice program, you do need to be a chartered by the state.

We use the word charter instead of accredited.

But for your list for for watchers, that's really what we're talking about.

The states process for approval as a part of that and as part of participating in the Choice program, the state does have the ability to do a desk audit if they if they want to.

My sense is they don't get if they don't get that much in the way of complaints and have not done so.

That's a fair question for for public debate.

I think that's you know, and, you know, policymakers will have to make that decision.

The one one of the differences is and this is a little semantics, but but it's real.

It's based on law is these dollars are going to families to make the independent purchasing decision because of legal precedent, because of even U.S. Supreme Court decisions.

It doesn't the money does not go directly to the private schools.

And so that's just a a bit of a hoop that then creates a little bit different scenario in terms of of looking at the the data, in terms of accountability.

We have long advocated for more transparency around especially the academic outcomes for nonpublic schools.

And I am excited, too, to note that the Legislature this year added a growth measure that all private schools participating in voucher programs will receive looking at how much students go up or down once they enter that nonpublic school.

Because all the students taking a voucher have to take a nationally normed reference test.

And they've said, Listen, the Department of Education put together a way to study how much growth students in those schools are making.

And I think that'll be a very important thing for families to have a very important data point.

Now, there'll be there's lots of things besides test scores that affect parents in both public school and private school, but it matters if kids are reading well and are doing math well.

So hopefully this will be will be a great new data source for families to be able to see the schools that are really driving positive change in students.

Your colleague Aaron Churchill said the problems that school districts are facing are a result of economic, demographic and educational factors that are unrelated to vouchers.

So how do we as a state resolve those problems for the majority of kids who are in public schools who are not going to be going to private schools, who are not going to be taking vouchers?

Yeah.

Those and the schools are constitutionally required.

Absolutely.

We the state of Ohio will only be as good as our public schools are.

We need to keep working hard to make really great public schools so every student has access to a great neighborhood school.

And if they choose to, maybe a great charter school or a great private school they have access to, we're closer to that than we've ever been, But there's still a long way to go.

We actually, you know, state report cards just came out last week.

We need to keep tabs on how students are doing.

Fortunately, many students have caught up in English language arts, but they're still struggling deeply in math.

The legislature this year and the governors, one of the governor's major reform policies, was really to go after literacy and make sure we continue to keep students, especially our most disadvantaged students, because that those students have not caught up in reading, making sure they have great teachers, properly trained, using great instructional materials to to make a difference.

I mean, reading is going to unlock pathways to success for so many of our students.

And right now, too few students are reading proficiently.

Only around 60% of third graders.

So we've got a long way to go.

But I know from Fordham's perspective, we will always be focusing on trying to make all schools as good as possible, and that definitely includes the regional public schools.

And finally, when it comes to the choice expansion, again, more than half of the families that are applying now for vouchers are sending their kids to private school, have never sent their kids to public school.

But on the private school side, is there a capacity in the private schools to absorb growth in that program if it continues on to this point and you have more people choosing to send their kids to private school through vouchers?

Yeah, You know, I think time will tell with that.

So when we advocate for parents having more options and private school choice, we've typically advocated not that we want kids to go to a private school.

So if private schools are full and there are no more spaces, from Fordham's perspective, I'm fine with that.

If there ends up being a supply side response and private schools expand to serve more students, that's fine too.

As long as they're doing a good job and serving kids well and families want to go there.

But so we we we certainly don't judge the success of the program by the number of students being served.

We'd just like to see all families have the have as many options, as many high quality options as possible.

So one thing I think that has probably constrained capacity over the last few years, probably the last four years in two budget cycles, the average scholarship amount has increased tremendously.

Before private schools, just because the economics of it were would fill, they have a couple of extra third grade seats or three or four in fourth grade.

They would fill up those empty seats because they can bring in a new student and not have additional costs associated with those students.

So if it was a $4,200 voucher amount, that was fine.

But but now that this voucher amount is more, there's a chance that it might make sense to build an expansion, but we won't know that until the data plays out.

But when the scholarship amounts are a little bit higher, we'll we'll see over time whether there's a supply side response.

And you said that public schools are getting more funding than they've ever gotten.

But I mean, inflation is what it is and growth is what it is.

Our public schools funded appropriately.

We believe they are.

In fact, we wrote a report a few years ago when the cut Paterson school funding formula was first being debated because one of the biggest claims is Ohio schools are unconstitutional and quite the funding system, excuse me, is unconstitutional.

And quite honestly, I don't think the data supports that anymore.

It once did, but the legislature, since the first draft case, has made a lot of changes and deserves credit for that.

If it is unconstitutional, there is there is an avenue you can sue and try to determine if that's the case.

They haven't done that.

Instead, the law, the lawsuit only recently has just been about their choice.

But overall, I think the school funding system with the Paterson changes that have been acted over the last three budgets now almost surely mean that Ohio's school funding system is constitutional, is funded appropriately, and the legislature, the governor and advocates on both sides deserve credit for that because all students should be funded properly.

And a reminder, I talked last week with two representative of school districts that are suing the state over the voucher program.

You can find that interview in our archive at State News dot org.

Ohio made global news this week.

The Hopewell ceremonial earthworks in southern Ohio is now one of around a thousand UNESCO's World Heritage sites and one of only 25 in the US.

The designation means these earthen mounds, engineered and built by indigenous people some 2000 years ago, are considered of universal importance.

The Hopewell ceremony earthworks encompass eight locations across southern Ohio.

Their precise design and construction show The people during this early era had a clear understanding of geometry, architecture and astronomy.

And that is it for this week.

For my colleagues at the Statehouse News Bureau, Ohio Public Radio and Television.

Thanks for watching.

Please check out our website at State News dot org or find us online by searching the State of Ohio show.

Joe Ingles will be in this chair next week.

Please join us again then for the state of Ohio.

Support for the statewide broadcast of the state of Ohio.

Comes from medical mutual providing more than 1.4 million Ohioans peace of mind with a selection of health insurance plans online at med mutual dot com slash Ohio by the law offices of Porter Wright, Morris and Arthur LLP.

Now with eight locations across the country, Porter Wright is a legal partner with a new perspective to the business community more at Porter Wright dot com and from the Ohio Education Association representing 124,000 members who work to inspire their students to think creatively and experience the joy of learning online at OHEA.org.