Education surplus reignites debate over education vouchers in Arizona

PHOENIX (AZFamily) – Despite expanding Arizona’s school voucher program, the Department of Education still spent less money overall on K-12 education than state lawmakers had budgeted, according to the department and an analysis by the state’s bipartisan budget committee.

Supporters of school choice say the modest savings – about $352,000 – show that the vouchers saved taxpayers money and did not increase the state’s budget deficit. But the financial impact of universal vouchers remains hotly contested.

“The universal school voucher program is unsustainable,” a spokesperson for Gov. Katie Hobbs said by email. “Irresponsible school vouchers do not save taxpayers money or provide Arizona students with a better education.”

The state was able to achieve savings in education, although spending on the Empowerment Scholarship Account program exceeded projections by $92 million, according to the bipartisan Joint Legislative Budget Committee. Spending on the ESA program was offset by lower enrollment in district schools and charter schools, resulting in savings of $93 million.

“I think many opponents of the program want to hide the fact that it costs less per student than the public school system,” says Matt Beienburg, education policy director at the Goldwater Institute.

“Even though more children participate in the ESA program, this offsetting of savings from children not attending public school at taxpayer expense actually means taxpayers spend less,” he added.

In other words, every time a student leaves a district school or a charter school and goes to a private school with a voucher, the state saves money, Beienburg said. Beienburg released an analysis of the savings this month.

Other experts argue that it costs the state more money when students leave district schools to participate in the voucher program.

A study released earlier this year by the Grand Canyon Institute estimates that ESAs cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars in net costs. Their research suggests that most of the vouchers go to private school students, who continue to attend.

“We estimated that about 80% of the children in the ESA program have never participated before and the net cost is $330 million, taking into account the costs that would be incurred without the ESA program. So their calculations are simply wrong,” said Dave Wells, research director at GCI.

There is no doubt that mathematics is complicated – and so are the numbers underlying the various economic models.

Wells and Beienburg gave different estimates of the cost of educating a student in a district school, ranging from $5,000 to $15,000.

Part of this disparity is due to the fact that district schools receive local, state and federal funding. Some analysts focus on total taxpayer spending, while others limit costs to the state’s share—a small example that illustrates why cost and savings models can lead to different conclusions.

While the JLBC analysis spoke of $352,000 in education savings in fiscal year 2024, Arizona Secretary of Education Tom Horne announced that “baseline state aid payments” for district schools, charter schools and the ESA program were $4.3 million under budget for the year.

“A surplus of more than $4 million is clear proof that the critics who have claimed that the ESA program will not only blow the state’s education budget, but the entire budget, have always been wrong. It has always been a myth, and that myth has been completely shattered,” Horne said.

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