Educational Choice Research Reports
Educational Choice
The Status of Use-Based Exclusions & Educational Choice After Espinoza
In this article, Michael Bindas discusses the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Espinoza v. Montana Department for Revenue, in which the Court held that states cannot bar families participating in educational choice programs from choosing…
Educational Choice
12 Myths and Realities About Private Educational Choice Programs
Educational choice programs—defined broadly as programs that provide parents with financial aid to help their children opt out of the traditional public school system—are a hallmark of meaningful educational reform. Yet despite widespread news coverage…
Educational Choice
A Guide to Designing Educational Choice Programs
Over the course of the last few decades, the law has gradually changed to recognize the constitutionality of educational choice programs and that its beneficiaries are students, not schools. The most recent development is Espinoza…
Educational Choice
Federal Special Education Law and State School Choice Programs
In this article, Nat Malkus and Tim Keller outline the federal laws that protect students with disabilities, give an overview of school choice programs, and explain how participating in school choice programs affects the rights…
Educational Choice
12 Myths and Realities about Private Educational Choice Programs
Educational choice programs—defined broadly as programs that provide parents financial aid to opt their children out of the traditional public school system—have been a topic of significant public discussion and debate in recent months. Despite…
Educational Choice | Tax Credit Scholarships
On Common Constitutional Ground
Launched in 2008, Georgia’s scholarship tax credit program will help over 13,000 children get the best education for their needs at secular and religious private schools this year. But in 2014 school choice opponents sued…
Educational Choice
Opening the Schoolhouse Doors
Alabama’s scholarship tax credit programs follow in the footsteps of at least six similar tax credits dating to the 1970s that give students a choice of public, private or religious schools, demonstrating that scholarship tax…
Educational Choice
Opening the Schoolhouse Doors
Indiana’s Choice Scholarship Program empowers thousands of families to choose the best K-12 schools for their children—public, private or religious—just like state-funded college scholarship programs have done for decades.
Educational Choice
Expanding Choice
Scholarship tax credits would expand educational opportunities for Idaho families, building on long-standing state policies encouraging private investments in education, as well as successful school choice programs in other states.
Educational Choice
Special Needs Vouchers Aid Children and Promote Excellence
In the previous article, Dr. Corinne Harmon responds to my analysis of the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision in Cain v. Horne (Keller, 2009) that struck down two voucher programs for students with special needs—one for…
Educational Choice
The Florida Supreme Court vs. School Choice
School choice is the civil rights issue of the twenty-first century. In the Information Age, knowledge is not just power—it is destiny. As a result, no issue more fundamentally divides the “haves” and the “have-nots”…
Educational Choice
Bulletproofing School Choice
This paper brings together the hard-won lessons of IJ’s experiences to help advocates and lawmakers craft effective school choice legislation likely to withstand a legal challenge.
Educational Choice
School Choice and State Constitutions’ Religion Clauses
After the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Zelman v. SimmonsHarris, only state religion clauses represent a potential constitutional bar to the inclusion of religious options in properly designed school choice programs. The two most significant…
Educational Choice
The National Implications of Cain v. Horne
This commentary addresses the Arizona Supreme Court’s legal reasoning in Cain v. Horne, which struck down two voucher programs for special needs children pursuant to one of Arizona’s Blaine Amendments and explains that the court…
Educational Choice
School Choice and the Law
In 2009, the Journal of School Choice presented a special issue on school choice and the law, guest edited by Institute for Justice Director of Strategic Research Dick Carpenter. In this introduction, Carpenter explains that…
Educational Choice
Expanding Choice
School choice enjoys strong support among Montana residents, and of choice options, tax credits enjoy the greatest level of popularity. Such programs grant tax credits to taxpayers who donate to nonprofit organizations that give scholarships…
Educational Choice
Choice and Opportunity
On February 29, 2008, Gov. Bobby Jindal presented the Louisiana Legislature with a proposed budget allocating $10 million for a school choice initiative that would enable parents in New Orleans to send their children to…
Educational Choice
Expanding Choice
One of the oldest and more popular forms of school choice in the United States is educational tax credit. Like many other types of school choice, educational tax credits enable parents to send their children…
Educational Choice
Fatally Flawed
In October 2007, the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute released a research report on public school choice and parental involvement, Fixing the Milwaukee Public School: The Limits of Parent-Driven Reform. Unfortunately, as this analysis finds, the…
Educational Choice | Publicly Funded Scholarships
Private Choice In Public Programs
Georgia’s Special Needs Scholarship Program extends to a new group of students the same kind of educational choice already enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of Georgia citizens from prekindergarten through college. Prior to the adoption…
Educational Choice | Publicly Funded Scholarships
Private Choice In Public Programs
Voucher programs that give recipients the free and independent choice of an array of providers, including faith-based organizations, have a long and established history in Arizona, including six different educational voucher programs that help more…
Educational Choice | Tax Credit Scholarships
Fiscal Analysis of Arizona’s Corporate Tax Credit Scholarship Program
This report updates a 2005 analysis by Arizona’s Joint Legislative Budget Committee (JLBC) that looked at the fiscal impact of a proposed corporate tuition tax-credit scholarship program and reflects the program as actually passed in…
Educational Choice | Tax Credit Scholarships
Arizona Individual and Corporate Tax Credits
Arizona’s tax code, like that of many state, national and international governments, includes a series of tax credits individuals and corporations may use to offset taxes owed. Arizona’s individual and corporate scholarship tax credit programs…
Educational Choice
School Choice and the North Carolina Constitution
Education has always been an issue of central concern for the people of North Carolina. Even before statehood, the area’s colonists made concerted efforts to secure the blessings of education for their children. In 1776,…
Educational Choice
The Past Should Not Shackle the Present
In Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, the Supreme Court ruled that school voucher programs in which parents choose which schools, including religiously affiliated schools, their children attend do not violate the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. The consequences…