Diving a bit deeper, there's a fundamental debate about whether private schools taking vouchers will perform better than public schools. The essential argument

Diving a bit deeper, there's a fundamental debate about whether private schools taking vouchers will perform better than public schools. The essential argument in favor is based around the idea that with a free market and healthy competition we get a better education for less with lots of room to adapt to changing needs. Those who reject vouchers argue that education is not and cannot be a free market in the usual sense. An important property of a free market is the ability for companies to fail: indeed, the majority of startups and small businesses fail. And while it's acceptable for restaurants a grocery stores to come and go, a private school going under has serious consequences. Unless the school goes under in the middle of summer break, all the students will be out of an education for a time. Even if neighboring schools are able to immediately take in all the displaced students, the disruption costs students weeks of productive learning. Also, competition requires people to have different options when choosing a school, but there's no guarantee schools will crop up appropriately, especially if poorer school districts will come with smaller vouchers. Finally, relating back to the article, if the private schools have any choice in which students they take, they will be incentivized to avoid taking students with disabilities, which generally are more costly to educate. The proponent's response to all of this is that these problems can be alleviated with proper regulations, and then we leave the realm of ideology and it becomes a negotiation. Personally, I'm skeptical that a voucher system could be implemented well enough to improve education, though it could come out cheaper, but I don't think it's worth the risk. I'm open to the idea, though, or at least talking about it.