A Tennessee judicial panel has upheld the state’s school voucher law, which allows public tax dollars to be given to families to pay for private schooling.
Critics of vouchers argue that the law will weaken the state’s public education system, but the three-judge panel said counties and families who sued couldn’t prove how students would be immediately harmed by the program. They concluded that any concerns raised now are “speculative and representative of (opponents’) disapproval of policy.”
Plaintiffs are “simply asking the court to wade into a policy debate, something we cannot do,” the panel said Wednesday.
The ruling comes after a yearslong legal battle over the contentious voucher program, known as education savings accounts. Under the law, eligible families are given around $8,100 in public tax dollars to help pay for private school tuition and other preapproved expenses.
While the Republican-controlled Legislature approved the voucher program in 2019, the state has only been recently allowed to begin implementing the law this summer after the Tennessee Supreme Court lifted a key legal obstacle.