Both opponents and supporters of a proposal to use public money to fund private-school tuition in Pulaski County made their opening arguments in various news conferences Monday.
Proponents of the Capitol Promise Scholarship Pilot Program, including Gov. Asa Hutchinson, described the proposal as one that would level the playing field for low-income families who want to send their children to private schools.
Meanwhile, opponents said the voucher program was an unnecessary social experiment on primarily minority-group children.
Senate Bill 620 by Sen. Blake Johnson, R-Corning, would create a five-year pilot program in Pulaski County using $3.5 million a year in the governor's discretionary funds to send about 500 students to private schools.
The vouchers would be available only to students who qualify for school lunch-buying assistance under the federal National School Lunch Program. In Arkansas, children whose families make less than 185 percent of the federal poverty level -- $47,637 for a family of four -- would qualify.
Rep. Ken Bragg, R-Sheridan, the House sponsor of the bill, said at a news conference that some public-school students are like square pegs trying to fit in a round hole, and the proposal didn't represent a turn away from public education.
"I think the public school system is the backbone of our education system," Bragg said. "I'm an advocate -- a strong advocate for public schools. I'm an advocate of charter schools. I'm an advocate of private schools. I'm an advocate of home school. We need choices. One type of education structure cannot meet the need of every child."
[RELATED: Complete Democrat-Gazette coverage of the Arkansas Legislature]
Sen. Joyce Elliott, D-Little Rock, said at a separate news conference that opponents of the bill don't oppose any children accessing great education, but they oppose picking certain kids -- mostly from minority groups -- strictly in Pulaski County for a "social experiment."
"The bill says low-income students, but you'd have to be on another planet to not know what that means in practice," said Elliott, the vice chairman of the Senate Education Committee.
If approved, SB620 would not be the state's first voucher-like program. Currently, the state's Succeed Scholarship Program offers similar private-school scholarships to about 250 students with disabilities.
Voucher programs have been a contentious education policy issue across the nation. One side believes that such programs drain resources from public schools and create an inequitable education system. Proponents argue that parents should have the choice of using the public dollars for children at any school, whether public or private.
U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos last month announced a proposal to create a federal tax credit for donations to "locally controlled scholarship programs." It would require approval from Congress before being implemented.
DeVos tweeted in support of SB620 on Monday.
"Great to see Gov. @AsaHutchinson working to put the needs of AR students and families first," DeVos tweeted. "His #EducationFreedom proposal would give hundreds of low-income students the opportunity to access the right education for them."
Hutchinson said Monday that he has historically opposed using public funds to pay for private-school education in Arkansas, but the Capitol Promise Scholarships -- which will entail collecting a variety of student achievement and participation data -- would provide a useful look into whether such a program is viable here.
"Hopefully, the Legislature -- if it's successful -- will consider extending the project," the Republican governor said. "If you don't see the progression, the improvement in education skills; who knows how many students will apply, if you have 500 scholarships available and only 300 students apply for it, obviously there's not a need to expand it and there's something wrong with the program.
"I think it's certainly too early to talk about any expansion of it because we don't know whether this will be successful or not."
Rep. Tippi McCullough, D-Little Rock, who has taught and coached in public and private schools, said that SB620 would hurt classrooms across Pulaski County.
"This is a movement to abandon our public schools and instead send a few chosen kids to private schools," McCullough said. "It poses a threat to the very idea of public schools, and more importantly, turns its head on the state's responsibility to guarantee a good education for all students."
Capital Promise Scholarships would equal 80 percent of the per-student funding rate the state distributes to public schools for students in kindergarten through eighth grade. The scholarships would equal the full per-pupil amount -- $6,781 this school year -- for high-school students.
The program would offer $5,000 scholarships for students who continue in the program through college. Those students would have to graduate from high school with at least a 2.5 grade-point average, and they may attend Arkansas Baptist College, Philander Smith College, University of Arkansas-Pulaski Technical College, University of Arkansas at Little Rock or Shorter College. Pulaski Tech and UALR are public; the others are private.
The funds, under the proposal, must first be spent on tuition, fees, uniforms and textbooks. Remaining funds may be used on tutoring, college-placement exams, transportation, after-school programs, industry-certification exams, speech-language pathology, physical therapy, dyslexia and other support services.
Sponsors of the bill said that Pulaski County was chosen because it had a large population of eligible students and numerous private schools and eligible colleges.
Pulaski County is home to four traditional public school districts: Little Rock, North Little Rock, Pulaski County Special and Jacksonville/North Pulaski, as well as about a dozen publicly funded open-enrollment charter school campuses.
Typically, when a student leaves a traditional school district, the district becomes ineligible for receipt of state aid for that student.
The bill includes a provision that a school district that is operating under full state authority shall not have its state funding reduced as a result of any loss of public school students to the Capital Promise Scholarship pilot program. Hutchinson said this provision was included in the bill after he met with the Legislative Black Caucus, which opposes the bill.
Hutchinson said Monday that he hopes the Little Rock district -- which has been operating under state control without an elected school board since January 2015 -- can return to local control next year if it has made the necessary improvements.
Current state law directs the state Board of Education to return to local control within five years any school district that has corrected the problems that led to state takeover. The Education Board also has the authority to take other actions against a state-controlled district that is not considered eligible for release to a locally elected board. That can include consolidating or reconstituting the district or even a partial or limited-authority release to a local community.
The state Education Board's deadline for acting on the Little Rock district is January 2020, which is before the proposed scholarship program -- if it becomes law -- could be operational.
Johnson, the bill's sponsor, said he expects the first Capital Promise Scholarship to be awarded in January 2020.
Democrats in the state House and Senate have also introduced a bill that would tweak how state-controlled districts can be returned to local school boards. Hutchinson said Monday that he thought the current law was adequate.
Information for this article was contributed by Cynthia Howell of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Metro on 03/26/2019