NYSUT statement on Trump administration’s private school voucher regulations

Statement from NYSUT President Melinda Person regarding the temporary and proposed regulations for Trump's private school voucher scheme:

"Today's proposed regulations confirm exactly what we have warned from the beginning: New York must reject this federal voucher scheme.

The regulations are loaded with poison pills. If New York opts in, the state would be prohibited from setting standards for scholarship organizations, deciding which organizations can participate, or limiting the types of schools and expenses that receive these federal tax dollars.

That means New York could be forced to help funnel taxpayer-subsidized dollars to private schools that have admissions policies and practices that would never be acceptable in our public schools, while being denied the authority to put stronger safeguards around the program.

New York puts its name on the program, but Washington writes the rules. We take responsibility for participating, but surrender much of our ability to determine where the money goes and what standards recipients must meet.

This isn't local control. It is a one-way door into a federally designed voucher program, one that could use public resources to support schools that discriminate, while stripping New York of the ability to impose the protections New Yorkers expect. Gov. Hochul should make clear now that New York will not walk through that door."

Read the regulations here:

• Rules: Federal Scholarship Tax Credit
• Proposed Rules: Federal Scholarship Tax Credit