Garsh! That's Goofy: Florida tax dollars pay for voucher students' Disney trips.
I knew the ongoing dismantling of public education in Florida had accelerated to new levels of audacity but I failed to notice that it included using taxpayer dollars to pay for theme park visits for kids who opt out of public schools.
In case you haven’t been paying attention, Florida’s expanded voucher programs now strip about $3.9 billion a year from what used to be money dedicated to public schools. Public schools now only get 77% (and shrinking by the year) of the state education pie. The rest goes to two statewide voucher programs for kids being educated in private, religious and home schools.
So called “school choice” started in Florida as an alternative for the poorest of kids already enrolled in underperforming public schools. But today, money that had formerly gone to public schools pays for more than 500,000 “scholarships” vouchers to private schools and home-schooling parents without any consideration for income limits or prior enrollment in public school for the child.
About 70% of the Florida kids getting voucher money through the state had never been educated in a public school in the state, a new report from the Florida Policy Institute estimated.
https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/opinion/columns/2025/01/23/florida-school-vouchers-fund-disney-trips/77877899007/
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