"Ah-ni-mal," 9-year-old Sarah sounded out under her breath. Once she felt confident enough, she wrote the word "animal" as best she could on her worksheet and then asked her teacher, who was sitting right across from her, to check her spelling.
It was only off by a few letters, but Sarah's teacher still noted that the fourth grader has come a long way in both spelling and handwriting. That news pleased Sarah's mother, Kayla Svedin, who was observing Sarah while she worked.
Sarah is part of a learning pod inside a little nook on the second floor of a Gilbert home where she and a friend have access to a private teacher.
It's an option that was made possible through an award from the state’s Empowerment Scholarship Account Program. The individualized, one-on-one instruction has been helpful to Svedin's daughter, who is on the autism spectrum and struggles with things like handwriting and speech and it’s something Sarah wasn’t able to get at her public school, despite having a fantastic teacher, the mother said.
“She’s really gotten back to enjoying school again where she was getting really frustrated in the classroom not being able to follow along or finish a timed test as quickly as everybody else, and she left school every day feeling stupid," Svedin said.
Currently, this program is only open to certain students such as children with disabilities, those attending D- or F-rated schools or living on a Native American reservation but a bill that's making its way through the Republican-controlled state Legislature. This effort comes nearly about two years after voters rejected another piece of legislation that would have made the ESA program universal.
This bill is needed now more than ever, said Republican state Sen. Paul Boyer.
“COVID has highlighted how far behind minority students in particular are," he said. "All the experts are telling me that minority students are 12-18 months behind their white counterparts."
Unlike the Proposition 305 school voucher expansion effort which failed by a 2-1 margin, Boyer said his bill has support from about 70% of voters, including more than 60% of Hispanic families, as shown by a statewide survey by the conservative Center for Arizona Policy.
Approximately 256,000 public school students are currently eligible for ESA under existing standards, according to the bill's fiscal note, but as of January less than 10,000 students are enrolled in the program.
As it's currently written, it's estimated if SB 1452 passes, it's estimated that it would make at least 800,000, or nearly three-quarters, of Arizona's public school students, eligible for the program.
Svedin, a Black parent, is one of the bill’s supporters. Through her nonprofit Empowered Arizona Families, Svedin has heard over the years and recently during the pandemic from many of the families that Boyer’s targeting families that don’t qualify for the program, but desperately want another option.
"It was hard to tell some of these families that didn’t have resources otherwise that there weren’t any other options for them," she said.
That’s the situation for Regina McCollum, a Black mother in Laveen Village. Her daughter’s grades have slipped since her school, Roger Ranch Elementary, has been offering only remote classes. This and other frustrations have made McCollum interested in other options like private school.
“Usually in a community like this, a lot of low-income people here, they tend to give us the bare minimum," McCullom said. "I just feel like if my daughter wants to go to school in Mesa, and I can get her there or there’s transportation to get her there, she should be able to go there.”
But two Black schools leaders that represent these communities disagree that vouchers are the best solution for low-income and minority students.
“Having been an advocate for families of color for more than two decades, I know what it takes to support Black and brown children. It takes full funded public school education in their neighborhoods," Berdetta Hodge, Tempe Union High School District governing board member, and vice president of the Arizona Schools Board Association (ASBA) Black Alliance.
“To put it lightly, to introduce a voucher program while many vulnerable communities are struggling with COVID-19 is flat out cruel and wrong," said Devin Del Palacio, Tolleson Union High School District governing board president and immediate past president of the ASBA Black Alliance.
During the pandemic, Del Palacio said the Tolleson district has served about one million meals to its students and their siblings and has also provided mental health services.
“We would not have been able to achieve or meet those basic needs if we had a voucher program that sucked money out of public funding for public schools and went to private schools," he said.
That’s because an ESA award consists of state funding that would have otherwise been allocated to the school district or charter school for the qualified student. Critics like Del Palacio say this hurts an already underfunded public education system, but Boyer pushes back.
“These students have been left behind for decades and we can’t wait until schools are fully funded, whatever that means," he said. "I’ve asked opponents of my bill, ‘What does fully funded look like?” Practically they never give me a number.”
Del Palacio doesn’t fault parents for doing what they think is best for their child, but thinks supporting a bill that could possibly take schools ability to their children is counterproductive.
Instead, he urges parents to work with the school leaders to find solutions.
