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Michigan parents are blocked by the state constitution from exercising school choice options for their children in kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school. Yet strangely, there is bipartisan support for state financial assistance to parents and students who choose to attend private preschools and colleges.
Why should support for school choice stop once children enter kindergarten and only come up again when they graduate high school?
Parents who want to send their kids to preschool have a number of taxpayer-funded programs available to them to help pay the costs. Students who want to go to college also have access to a variety of taxpayer-funded scholarship programs. Money is available to spend in private institutions, not just state colleges or preschool programs offered by public schools.
Preschool assistance is popular with both parties. So are taxpayer-funded scholarships to college students. But any taxpayer money to school choice in K-12 is controversial to lawmakers and forbidden by Article VIII, Section 2 of the state’s constitution, the so-called Blaine amendment of 1970.
This is a shame because most learning occurs between kindergarten and senior year of high school. It is in these years that the state can do the most good by funding students themselves rather than limiting financial support to the public school system. Yet this is just when the state prohibits taxpayer assistance to Michigan families who need options beyond failing public schools.
Detroit public schools consistently perform worse in reading and math than comparable districts in large cities nationwide. More than half the city’s students attend charter schools – and learn more than their peers enrolled in the neighboring district schools. Many others would benefit from attending a private school or homeschooling to receive more individualized learning support. But the cost of these alternative options is prohibitive for many families, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds – the ones at highest risk of failing in the conventional school system.
Policymakers already argue for scholarships outside the K-12 window.
“I am so excited that we worked across the aisle to establish the Michigan Achievement Scholarship, lowering the cost of college by thousands of dollars a year for the vast majority of graduating seniors, starting with the class of 2023,” said Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2022.
The governor has been equally enthusiastic about offering choice for preschoolers.
“Free pre-K is here for Michigan families, and there is still time to enroll in a program in your area,” said Whitmer in 2024. “This is a huge win for Michigan families that gives kids the educational foundation they need and saves parents thousands on child care costs.”
But Michigan leaders show far less interest in lowering out-of-pocket expenses for parents who want to bolster their kids’ education with scholarships in K-12 education. This ought to change.
And indeed, it is changing outside of the state of Michigan. More than thirty states offer scholarships, tax credits or similar programs that reimburse parents for K-12 tuition or other educational expenses. And 17 states offer education scholarship accounts to help parents pay for whatever education opportunities they choose.
This is how it should be. Parents ought to be in charge and direct the taxpayer resources authorized for their children’s education as they see fit.
It is unfortunate that public school interest groups see any scholarship opportunity as a threat rather than an improvement to education. They get funding for each student in attendance, and they want to keep that funding. Michigan continues to support a “Kids for Our Schools” mentality that says education funding should support the public school bureaucracy rather than the actual student – even while other states are moving toward funding models that empower the family instead of the government.
The point of the education system is to educate students. Parents with modest means lack the opportunities available to wealthier families for tutoring, private schools or anything else their kids could use. They are often forced into a public education system that is managed for the benefit of the adults who administer the system rather than for the students they educate.
This isn’t the case for education before kindergarten, and it’s not state policy for education after high school. School choice ought to be available for K-12 as well, and lawmakers ought to propose amending Michigan’s constitution to allow scholarships.
Permission to reprint this blog post in whole or in part is hereby granted, provided that the author (or authors) and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy are properly cited.
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