Coalition challenges voucher program

Christian Century, August 11, 1999

Groups opposed to controversial school voucher programs have filed a federal lawsuit seeking to ban a three-year-old voucher program in Cleveland. The coalition of teachers' unions and civil liberties groups says the program violates the U.S. Constitution by funneling tax dollars into religious schools. The Cleveland program allows some 4,000 low-income students to attend private schools. The opposing groups include the National Education Association, the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Besides the church-state issue, the critics charge that voucher programs deprive public schools of much-needed funds and that test scores among participants do not improve. The head of the Cleveland Scholarship Program says the success of the program is evidenced by its long waiting list. "This office has been under siege from the beginning of its existence," Saundra Berry told the Washington Times. "I wonder who they are really thinking about---certainly not the children when they want to disrupt so many lives."

With one month left before school is to resume, the Ohio Department of Education said it is prepared to accommodate the extra students if an injunction sends the thousands of pupils back to public schools this fall. "We would have to hire more teachers," said Cleveland Public Schools spokeswoman Patricia Martin. "We will do whatever we have to do to get school off and running smoothly."

This is the second time groups have challenged the constitutionality of Cleveland's voucher program. The Ohio Supreme Court ruled in May that the program is not in violation of church-state separation as guaranteed by the U.S. and Ohio constitutions. However, the program was shut down on a technicality in state law. The Ohio legislature revived the program in June. That move prompted the latest legal challenge.