04/26/2026
Ohio taxpayers are now spending over $1 BILLION a year on private school vouchers.
Let that number sink in for a second. One billion dollars. Every year. Out of the state budget.
Here's what most people don't know about where that money is going and You need to be having these conversations with your neighbors!
95% of the new vouchers issued in FY2024 went to families whose kids were already in private school. They weren't leaving public schools. They were already gone. The state (YOU) just started picking up their tuition.
That's not school choice. That's a tuition subsidy for families who already made their choice — paid for by every Ohio taxpayer, including the ones whose own public schools are falling apart.
And before someone says "the money should follow the student" — it's not following anyone. Those students were already in private school. The money moved. They didn't.
But even if it were, when a student leaves a public school, the building doesn't get smaller. The bus still runs. The teacher still shows up. The district loses the funding but keeps the costs, and the the private school receiving that billion dollars has zero obligation to report how it's spent or whether students are learning anything.
If public money follows the student, public accountability should follow the money. It doesn't.
Here's what that billion dollars breaks down to: about $20 a month from every Ohio household. For private schools. That nobody voted on.
You know what else costs about $20 a month per household? A 1% increase in the state sales tax — enough to fund every public school district in the state. All 595 that are projecting deficits. All 990,000 kids.
Same cost. One funds 150,000 students who were already in private school. The other funds 990,000 kids in public schools that are cutting teachers, gutting programs, and heading for state takeover.
The legislature chose vouchers. They didn't ask you. But you get to choose the legislature.
May 5 is 13 days away. Legislative primaries are on that ballot. The people who made this decision — and the people who could reverse it — are chosen by whoever shows up.
Last primary, 80% of Ohio voters stayed home.
The people who wanted a billion dollars in public money sent to private schools? They showed up.
Did you?
