**The Impact of Religious Schools on Public Education: A Financial Analysis**
On a Thursday morning last May, about a hundred people gathered in the atrium of the Ohio capitol building to join in Christian worship. The “Prayer at the Statehouse” was organized by an advocacy group called the Center for Christian Virtue, whose growing influence was symbolized by its new headquarters, directly across from the capitol. It was also manifest in the officials who came to take part in the event: three state legislators and the ambitious lieutenant governor, Jon Husted.
**The Rise of Private-School Vouchers in Ohio**
The center had played a key role in bringing about one of the most dramatic expansions of private-school vouchers in the country, making it possible for all Ohio families—even the richest among them—to receive public money to pay for their children’s tuition. In the mid-nineteen-nineties, Ohio became the second state to offer vouchers, but in those days they were available only in Cleveland and were billed as a way for disadvantaged children to escape struggling schools. Now the benefits extend to more than a hundred and fifty thousand students across the state, costing taxpayers nearly a billion dollars, the vast majority of which goes to the Catholic and evangelical institutions that dominate the private-school landscape there.
**The Growing Concerns and Controversies**
The risks of universal vouchers are quickly coming to light. Many private schools are raising tuition rates to take advantage of the new funding, and new schools are being founded to capitalize on it. With private schools urging all their students’ families to apply, the money is flowing mostly to parents who are already able to afford tuition and to kids who are already enrolled in private schools. When vouchers do draw students away from public districts, they threaten to exacerbate declining enrollment, forcing underpopulated schools to close. More immediately, the cost of the programs is soaring, putting pressure on public-school finances even as private schools prosper.
**The Political Maneuvering and Legal Challenges**
The voucher movement has been aided by a handful of billionaire advocates; it was also enabled, during the pandemic, by the backlash to extended school closures. Yet much of the public, even in conservative states, remains ambivalent about vouchers: voters in Nebraska and Kentucky just rejected them in ballot referendums.
How, then, has the movement managed to triumph? The campaign in Ohio provides an object lesson—a model that voucher advocates have deployed elsewhere. Its details are recorded in a trove of private correspondence, much of it previously unpublished, that the movement’s leaders in Ohio sent to one another. The letters reveal a strategy to start with targeted programs that placed needy kids in parochial schools, then fight to expand the benefits to far richer families—a decades-long effort by a network of politicians, church officials, and activists, all united by a conviction that the separation of church and state is illegitimate.
**The Human Impact Behind the Numbers**
As the voucher expansion continues to shape the landscape of education in Ohio, the consequences are felt deeply by both public and private schools, as well as by families navigating the changing educational landscape. The story of C.J. Prentiss, a tireless defender of public education, highlights the personal stakes and moral convictions at play in the battle over vouchers. Her dedication to ensuring equitable education for all students, regardless of background, serves as a reminder of the human impact behind the policies and funding decisions being made at the state level.
In the end, the debate over private-school vouchers in Ohio is far from over. With ongoing legal challenges, political maneuvering, and growing public scrutiny, the future of education funding in the state hangs in the balance. As policymakers, advocates, and families continue to grapple with the implications of expanding voucher programs, the broader implications for the quality, equity, and accessibility of education in Ohio remain at the forefront of public discourse.
