Shedding Light on School Choice

There is actually a lot of data on private school choice programs, if you can find it

As school choice grows across the country, almost every day a piece of commentary is published arguing that voucher, tax credit, and ESA programs are “not transparent.”

But just because people say that, it doesn’t mean it’s true.

In fact, while not perfect, most state programs make a lot of information available about student participation, amounts spent, and even student performance. But some are better than others in making that information accessible.

To both demonstrate what is out there and perhaps prod states into being better about how they make information available, I wanted to look at five states with universal or near-universal private school choice programs and how they make information about the program known.

Bottom line: All states’ reporting systems have pros and cons, and aspects of each are worth understanding and emulating.

Arizona – Reporting on the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program

Arizona’s ESA program is one of the most well-known programs in the country. Not only was it the first ESA to grant universal eligibility, but it is also one of the largest in the country in terms of raw participation. With such a high-profile choice program, you’d expect the reporting of the program to be in the same realm of quality.

Arizona’s reporting tackles quite a bit of information. It makes clear the high-level figures, including total participation and total amount of scholarships awarded. It also gets into the weeds a bit, revealing the breakdown of participation by eligibility category, the percentage of participants who attended a public school immediately before enrolling in the program, the percentage of participants who have a disability, as well as showing which school district or charter school the participants attended before enrolling in the program.

The only knock on the reporting is the general lack of demographic data for participants in the program. While the reports signal the percentage of students with disabilities, and the zip code from which participating students reside in, there is no data on the gender, race/ethnicity, or household income for participating students.

Best Quality: Frequency. The Arizona Department of Education produces quarterly reports on the ESA program. These reports are quite rich with data and information on the program, and to produce these reports quarterly is a testament to great work being done in Arizona to ensure transparency and accountability.

Arkansas – Reporting on the Arkansas Education Freedom Accounts (EFA) program

The Arkansas EFA annual report packs a punch, despite the fact that the EFA program is only a few years old. The report, written by the University of Arkansas’ Department of Education Reform, checks all the boxes needed to ensure quality reporting.

The 2024-25 report, released this month, includes all the following data:

• Total participants
• Participation by eligibility criteria
• Participation by school sector
• Prior year enrollment data (switcher rate)
• Qualifying expenses (total expenditures, average cost, number of transactions)
• School retention rates
• Top 10 list of private schools and service providers by EFA expenditures
• Deep dive into the fiscal impact of the EFA program
• Student performance data (ELA, Math, Science)
• Parent satisfaction data

The last bullet is critical. Arkansas’ EFA program is one of the only programs in the country that is required to administer surveys to parents of EFA students to track their satisfaction with different aspects of the program.

Like Arizona, Arkansas’ EFA program lacks data on demographic characteristics of participants like gender, race/ethnicity, and household income.

Best quality: Visualizing the fiscal impact of the program. The report notes that the state of Arkansas is estimated to allocate around $3.7 billion to fund K-12 education. The EFA program, which just entered its first year of universal eligibility, has estimated costs of around $275 million. At this level, the report points out, the EFA program would account for around 7% of the total K-12 expenditures, while serving just under 10% of the total population of Arkansas K-12 students.

Indiana – Reporting on the Indiana Choice Scholarship program

Indiana’s annual report on the Choice Scholarship program, a voucher, made for an obvious inclusion on this list. With annual reports dating back to 2015-2016 (which also includes data on the program going back to 2011-12), Indiana has made a clear investment in the reporting of the state’s most expansive school choice program.

Indiana’s Choice Scholarship program report places a heavy emphasis on participant demographic data. The report includes data on the following:

• Race/ethnicity
• Gender
• Community type (urban, rural, etc.)
• Household income
• Household size

This data is in addition to critical reporting on data like prior year enrollment of participants, award amount, participation by grade level, special education data, and student retention.

Indiana’s report also compares the current year’s data with the data from the previous year, which is helpful to understand the trajectory of certain data points.

Best quality: The depth of demographic data provided within the reports.

North Carolina – Reporting on the North Carolina Opportunity Scholarships program

North Carolina’s voucher program has grown to over 80,000 students over the last few years.

The high quality of the reporting is apparent from the start. The North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority (NCSEAA) breaks out the data by county, showing the total number of students and total amount of funds used. In that same tab, there is a comprehensive list of every school that has received funds from participating students across the state.

Additionally, there is ample historical and demographic data. The data on the program goes back to 2014-15, showing the total amount of funds disbursed to students as well as the total number of students participating in the program. As for the demographic data, NCSEAA provides a look into the race/ethnicity, gender, and grade level of the participants. It also breaks down how many students are new to the program compared to the number of students who are renewals. There is no participant data on household income or prior year enrollment, however.

Best quality: The platform is incredibly user friendly. The maps are a nice touch, as well as the ability to download the data in excel.

Ohio – Reporting on the EdChoice Expansion Scholarship program

The Ohio Department of Education’s reporting platform is not too different from North Carolina’s. The reports portal is user friendly, allowing those interested to look at different aspects of the program without having to go into separate PDFs for past data. The portal provides data on the programs going back to 2014. There is a maneuverability in the reporting that is uncommon. You can filter by year, by the specific program, and by demographic characteristics.

Race/ethnicity, gender, grade, and application type are the only demographic breakouts offered. Like North Carolina, there is no data available in the portal that looks at household income or prior year enrollment. All of the data can be exported quite easily to excel.

Best quality: Data for multiple programs in one place. Ohio is unique in that the state has 5 voucher programs operating simultaneously. While each program is different, the data on the programs can be easily accessed in the same place. Simply clicking on the “select scholarship” drop down will allow you to choose from any of the 5 voucher programs.

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Two things can be true at the same time. Private school choice programs can be more transparent than people think while still being imperfect. Taking the best from each of these state reports would create an amazing repository of information that parents, school leaders, policymakers, and taxpayers could use.

This was originally posted to our Substack.