Voucher-style programs support "segregation academies," report says
Private schools across the South that were established for white children during desegregation are now benefiting from tens of millions in taxpayer dollars flowing from rapidly expanding voucher-style programs, a ProPublica analysis found.
Pro Publica reports that in North Carolina alone, 39 of these likely “segregation academies” are still operating and have received voucher money. Of these, 20 schools reported student bodies that were at least 85% white in a 2021-22 federal survey of private schools, the most recent data available.
Those 20 academies, all founded in the 1960s and 1970s, brought in more than $20 million from the state in the past three years alone. None reflected the demographics of their communities. Few even came close.
Northeast Academy, a small Christian school in rural Northampton County on the Virginia border, is among them. As of the 2021-22 survey, the school’s enrollment was 99% white in a county that runs about 40% white.
Every year since North Carolina launched its state-funded private school voucher program in 2014, the academy has received more and more money. Last school year, it received about $438,500 from the program, almost half of its total reported tuition.
Vouchers play a similar role at Lawrence Academy, an hour’s drive south. It has never reported Black enrollment higher than 3% in a county whose population hovers around 60% Black. A small school with less than 300 students, it received $518,240 in vouchers last school year to help pay for 86 of those students.
Segregation academies that remain vastly white continue to play an integral role in perpetuating school segregation — and, as a result, racial separation in the surrounding communities. Because North Carolina collects and releases more complete data than many other states, it offers an especially telling window into what is happening across this once legally segregated region where legislatures are rapidly expanding and adopting voucher-style programs.
Called Opportunity Scholarships, North Carolina’s voucher program launched in 2014. At first, it was only for low-income families and had barely more than 1,200 participants. Then last fall, state lawmakers expanded eligibility to students of all income levels and those already attending private school.
So many students flocked to the program that the state now has a wait list of about 54,000 children. Paying for all of them to receive vouchers — at a cost of $248 million — would more than double the current number of participants in the program. The General Assembly passed a bill in September to do just that.
Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed the measure. But the Republican supermajority is expected to override it before the year’s end.
