SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to Catholic in America, a podcast in partnership with OSV News. I'm Jason Adkins. School choice, or what's also sometimes known as parental choice in education, generates a lot of passion on all sides of the political spectrum. For some proponents, it's the lifeline to a better future and economic ladder out of poverty. For opponents, it augurs the destruction of the cherished public school system, or it violates constitutional boundaries between church and state. What is school choice really and why does it matter? In fact, why does support for legislative programs related to school choice or parental choice and education, why do those prescind from basic principles of Catholic social teaching? What does the data say? Does it help students who use school private school choice programs? Does it actually harm public schools? What's going on with the school choice debate that we hear more and more about, especially since we've just had the first national school choice program enacted, which is the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit, or what's called the Education Freedom Tax Credit, that was part of the federal tax bill in the summer of 2025. It's being implemented in states now. 29 states have opted into that program, and those tax credits become available in 2027. What those tax credits would do would use tax incentives at the federal level to generate and incentivize scholarships that could be given to students and across all sectors, public and private, to improve educational outcomes and educational achievement. But yet again, there are strong opponents and strong proponents of that program. Fortunately, we're able to be joined today by one of the emerging scholars in the school choice landscape, someone who has deep experience himself of non-public school education and Catholic education, Dr. Patrick Graff. He is a senior fellow with the American Federation for Children, where he advises the government affairs team and directs research on the impacts of school choice policies. He's also a research affiliate at the University of Notre Dame Center for Research on Education Opportunity, where he studies teacher quality across different school sectors. Dr. Graff has worked in the education field as a teacher, administrator, policy advisor, and researcher since his first year as a third grade teacher in 2011. He lives in South Bend, Indiana with his wife and four children, several of whom are now beneficiaries themselves of school choice programs to the Indiana Choice Scholarships Program. Dr. Graff has got some really great new research and studies on the impact of what happens to public school students and public school outcomes when you scale up school choice programs in a particular state. So we're glad to welcome Dr. Patrick Graff to the program. Dr. Patrick Graff, welcome to Catholic in America. It's a blessing to have you on the show. Great to be with you. We hear this term school choice. Sometimes it's called parental choice in education. People are told we got to be thinking about this in the Catholic world and taking it seriously, but what is it? What is school choice in a nutshell?

unknown 3:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:05

So school choice is really the policy that embodies a deeper philosophical uh stance on education, which is that parents and families should be the primary drivers and responsible for their kids' education. And so in order to make that possible, right, a lot of families will educate their kids at home. They can take on that educational charge themselves. But you know, so many of us, including, you know, with my own kids, uh, we trust our children to institutions that we partner with for their upbringing and for uh their formation, both in the faith as well as in the intellectual life. So, you know, knowing the history of education in the United States, we've had uh public schools for, you know, back until the early to mid-1800s, uh, but we've also had Catholic schools running alongside those. And so for particularly for Catholic families who it is a struggle to afford those options, uh, you know, some families have the means to be able to afford those uh private schools, which might include a Catholic school, but uh school choice policies more generally enable families to have access to funds, their state share of funding for education for their child to be able to take to a private school and be able to receive an education that way in the broadest terms.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Now, school choice programs come in different shapes and forms and things like that. How specifically do the school choice programs help parents uh afford different educational options?

SPEAKER_02 4:28

Yeah, so there's many broad buckets of school choice policies. So uh one that most folks have heard of are voucher programs. So these are kind of the original scholarship programs where the state gives you a set amount of money and they say, hey, family, you have$5,000 that you can go take and pay for tuition. Uh after that, there were a series of other programs that kind of innovated on that basic idea. Some of them were called tax credit scholarships. Uh, so this is a really popular way to incentivize giving to scholarship organizations. And there's a new federal one, uh, which I think is exciting, and particularly for places that do not have a state-level school choice program. There may be an opportunity for this tax credit scholarship type structure to open up in states that previously have not had anything. And this really enables families, uh donors to give money to scholarship organizations and they receive a tax credit for that. Uh, the new federal tax credit, you're giving uh up to$1,700 and then you get a one-to-one credit off of your federal taxes. So instead of paying$1,700 in federal taxes, that$1,700 can go to a scholarship organization, which can then give out scholarships to families for educational uh means. It's for basically to for different educational options. Um and uh, you know, a number of states now have these things called education savings accounts. Uh, sometimes they're called education freedom accounts or education scholarship accounts. Uh, but it's basically uh bringing this idea of a uh a broader set of educational expenses that you can cover with an account that is funded by the state. So it includes things like tuition, but also things like tutoring, special education services, sometimes transportation or even technology costs, uh, because we know that families have a lot broader expenses than just uh private school tuition when educating their kids. So a number of states have now adopted those. And we have uh over 30 states that have some kind of school choice policy at this point. And that's over 70 programs across those 30 states. So very widespread, huge adoption in the last five years. So it's really a dynamic time to be thinking about school choice and how to bring it to those remaining 20 some states that uh currently do not have that option.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

Estimates are that 85 to 90 percent of school age Catholic kids are in public schools. Not every Catholic is a parent. Um, some might be grandparents, single, whatever. But why should all Catholics care about school choice policies and their adoption?

SPEAKER_02 6:49

Yeah, I think most fundamentally, I mean, it goes back to uh our faith. So, you know, we know in the Catechism, it talks about how uh parents have this fundamental right to choose an education that corresponds to their own convictions. So that, you know, we as Catholics believe that parents, as the primary educator, should be the ones in the driver's seat making decisions about education, not the government. You can partner with the government to provide education for your child, uh, but fundamentally that is a family and a parent's right. And uh tied to that, and a lot of folks don't realize this, uh, that the catechism also speaks to uh public authorities and the uh role and importance of public authorities, so including state governments, to ensure that right. Uh, so that they have a duty to guarantee that parental right and create the actual concrete conditions for school choice. So that's language from uh our faith, that's language from our church. And I think a lot of Catholics don't realize that, even those um that may oppose some types of school choice policies. And I think there are reasonable ways to disagree with how some of them are structured, but at a more fundamental level, at a philosophical level, uh it really is deeply intertwined with the primacy of the family and raising kids.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Say a little bit of how that intersects with the principle of subsidiarity.

SPEAKER_02 8:06

Yeah, it's a great question, right? So I think, you know, education in the United States is already, uh, because of federalism, uh not something that's operated at the federal government level, right? Most of the funding for education comes from the state level and local level, not from the federal government. And so how education differs between states is already largely dictated by state law. And that mirrors in some ways the instinct of uh, you know, this uh teaching of the church of subsidiarity about locating as much authority and autonomy at the lowest possible level. So, you know, we drive a lot of authority to local public school districts, and I think within the church, we think in a very similar way, right? If parents are the ones primarily in charge of their kids' education, they should be the ones making the most consequential and important decisions for their children. Um so these types of policies help enable uh that more fundamental values uh proposition.

SPEAKER_01 9:07

Schools exist to support the work of parents as first educators, but not supplant them. That would be uh one way to think about it, it seems, in terms of subsidiarity. Um, but yet it seems that schools today often try to supplant uh the values and the work of parents in educating and forming their children, which is why school choice is also an attractive option more than for kids who are just socioeconomically disadvantaged and underperforming schools, but it's a it's become more of a values question than it was maybe in School Choice 1.0 in those early voucher programs in places like Milwaukee and Cleveland.

SPEAKER_02 9:44

Absolutely. And no, Jason, I think this is an area too where lots of folks, even beyond those that uh are practicing religious in some way, are starting to understand is such an important part of education. Uh that you know, education itself as an act is not neutral, that uh basically what we decide to teach and not teach, what gets included in a curriculum doesn't get included in curriculum, are all uh decisions and choices that are based upon more fundamental values. So uh you might say these are value-laden type choices. Uh, these aren't just kind of we're choosing between kind of objectively different sets of uh options. And, you know, I think one recent example that has been really interesting for me is how many parents have reacted in this wider backlash to uh the broad use of technology within schools. So, you know, there are now many, many, many public school districts that require your young student, maybe a third grader, to be on a Chromebook for four plus hours a day. Uh so you as a parent, if you have a value around, well, I want my kids to be not engaging with screens, I want them to be engaging with people and with books. Uh, and that is a value that I have that is maybe tied to some of the learning opportunities you would have in books and with people instead of through a computer screen that's mediated by an ed tech company. Um, you know, where are your choices if that is a value that you disagree with? You can take your grievances to the school board and hope they agree with you, uh, but so many, so often the school board itself uh is difficult to be responsive to those concerns of parents across many domains. So, what gives parents leverage to put pressure back on those leaders within a particular system like the public school system? The even the existence of choice, even if you never utilize it as a public school student or parent, uh provides you an option to say, hey, if we cannot reform the school or system that I'm a part of, I am going to take that other option. I'm gonna go somewhere that does kind of respect these fundamental values I have.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Well, you've done a nice job framing our discussion the rest of the way. School choice, not as just as a matter of good policy, but also for Catholics as a matter of principle as well. And I think that's a really helpful and important thing to highlight and underscore as we move forward. You're one of the great leaders in the school choice movement, excuse me, nationwide. Tell us a little bit about your background and how you got interested in this question in the first place, such that you're a uh you have a doctorate in education policy and sociology, and you're studying these things as a career. How did you get uh so interested in school choice as a topic?

SPEAKER_02 12:17

Yeah, I think most fundamentally, I, you know, I was a Catholic school kid. So I grew up going to Catholic schools. I think I am now the product of something like 27 years of Catholic education, some kind of outrageous number uh because of how long I was in grad school. Uh I uh, you know, I grew up in California where, you know, we had no school choice policy for uh private schools, but went to, it was lucky enough, my parents sacrificed a lot so that we could go to Catholic schools for elementary, middle school, and through high school. Uh, and ended up post-college uh teaching in a Catholic school. So I was a third-grade teacher in a Catholic school in Tampa, Florida. And there in Florida, we did have a school choice program. So there was a tax credit scholarship program, and about a third of our students were only able to attend because of that program. And, you know, at the time, I really saw school choice through the lens of those families. And I think for me, it was really powerful because uh, you know, being in Florida, we had a huge immigrant population, not just first generation, but second and third generation, people from all across the Caribbean and South America, uh really diverse in terms of where families were coming from. And we had this really vibrant Spanish mass on Sunday afternoons in our parish. And it wasn't until the tax credit scholarship made it possible that our school could actually look like our parish. And so, you know, for me, at a more fundamental level, I got really energized and powered up about school choice because this, these are community schools, right? In so many places, Catholic schools are community schools and they are have been historically barred from resources from the state uh because of our own particular history in the United States, which uh a lot of folks don't know this, but we are an outlier in the world. Most countries uh do not do that. Most countries do provide some funding for even religious schools. So uh a lot of folks wouldn't realize this, even just across the border in Canada, uh, they have publicly funded Catholic schools there. Uh, you know, I think we are lucky in the United States that we have very strong protections for religious liberty and free exercise. And I think that's an important dimension that we have that a lot of other countries don't. So I'm grateful that we have those protections. And, you know, in some places in Europe or Canada, don't have those same protections. But I think that this idea that we need to exclude certain organizations from receiving funding just because they're religious is uh fundamentally grounded in a historical context in the United States that was really discriminatory against uh Catholics in particular, but I think many religious groups more broadly uh over time that needs to be rectified.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

How did you see, as in your experience as a teacher, school choice programs moving the needle for kids in a concrete way? Like what were some of the learning differences you see? There's a school, just by way of example, here in the in the Twin Cities where it's you know apples to apples in terms of the student population it serves, you know, the percentage of kids on free and reduced lunch. But at the Catholic school, the kids who graduate from that school, the eighth graders, they go on to almost a hundred percent high school graduation rate, whereas the public school, right across like literally kitty corner across the street, you have a 40% high school graduation rate. So how are how are Catholic schools and school choice programs moving the needle for kids in a concrete way? How are they making a difference?

SPEAKER_02 15:28

Yeah, in many ways. So I mean, I can speak to this just from my own experience as a teacher, but also on the research level as well. So, you know, in my own school, what I saw were families often seeking another option because their the school they were in formerly wasn't working for their child. You know, I think a lot of folks have in this, have in their mind that, well, if you start a school choice program, you're just gonna get the kids who are the most advantaged within a public school system, are the ones who are have the fewest problems and their parents are able to kind of discern and pick different choices, uh, but often kind of fail to realize uh no one is gonna move schools when that school is serving them well. Moving schools is a difficult decision. Uh, you're creating a brand new peer group, you often have to drive further to go to a private school, maybe, than your local public school. Not always, but can be. Um, and often it's because they were struggling, right? They might be behind academically, they might be behind behaviorally, they might be having some discipline issues. And actually, we see that in the research where uh in Indiana, for example, when they started the voucher program, students who had a history of suspensions were actually more likely to use the Indiana voucher to switch uh than the very similar peers in their own schools that they left. So uh, you know, there's this broader myth that, you know, these students coming in, they're often seeking something they're not getting. Uh, and you know, in my school, what I often found was that kids were seeking a better social as well as academic environment. And oftentimes that social environment corresponded with uh a life of faith. They wanted their kids to be brought up in the faith and didn't have an opportunity for that within the traditional public school system in the same way and wanted to reconnect their family to the life of the church. And so they were able to do that in a very tangible way. So there's that piece of outcomes in terms of reintegrating into a religious community. Uh, but I think at a longer term look, uh, we know from the research that overwhelmingly kids who use school choice programs graduate from high school as well as enroll in college at much higher rates. And I think a lot of that has to do with the culture that particularly places like Catholic schools create around uh kids moving through education and the importance of not only finishing your high school education, but going on to do productive work in the world, whether that be through trade school, through the military, or through higher education. And the peers that you're surrounded with in a Catholic high school, for example, you know, everyone is thinking about those next plans. You're not uh surrounded by folks where, you know, the culture is, well, maybe I'll drop out, maybe uh I'll just kind of pick up whatever job happens to be around, but actually proactively thinking about, well, what's ahead for me? What's God's plan for me in my life, and how do I make steps to realize that? So we see that in the data as well, that these programs are really beneficial for kids long run.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

One of the interesting things about school choice programs is that it they allow schools to meet kids where they're at, you know. So sometimes we hear, well, school choice programs, you know, school, those private schools can discriminate or they can turn away kids with special needs or things like that. But in many ways, everyone's, you know, not to take away from kids with truly serious developmental and intellectual and physical disabilities, which we should be serving those kids. But at the same time, everyone has unique needs. And so what seems to be a great piece of about school choice is that it can serve kids and different types of kids where they're at, and perhaps in ways the traditional public school model can't always do.

SPEAKER_02 18:50

No, absolutely. And honestly, this is one of the criticisms that I can I find deeply frustrating from folks who are opposed to school choice. And it comes from a good place, right? They they want kids, especially kids with disabilities, to be well served by our education system, and in so many places they are not. But the question to me is if their public school system is not serving them well, what options do they have open to them? And there are so many private options that have open to help meet those needs. And in particular, you see many private schools that exist specifically to serve particular populations of kids with special needs. So schools for kids with autism, schools for kids that have uh severe learning challenges, schools for kids with Down syndrome, for example. Um, you know, in Florida, where I taught, they now have a program. It's called the Family Empowerment Scholarship for Unique Abilities. They have over 150,000 kids with disabilities in that program now. And I've we've heard stories of families moving to the state of Florida in order to take advantage of that program so that they can send their child who has unique needs to a specialized school that can actually meet those. Uh, you know, and the challenge is, you know, most private schools, most Catholic schools, do not receive any funding from or very little funding from the federal government to uh meet special education needs. So sometimes there's this sense in the policy debate saying, well, we should be requiring you to take every single student that applies to your school, but at the same time, there's no uh commensurate demand to say all of the money should follow the kid so that they could actually be served by a school. Um, you know, I think a lot of people also just don't realize that the federal education law, IDEA, uh, that kind of makes this requirement that schools have to serve all kids on the public school side, that's a requirement that's placed on public school districts, not an individual school of any one individual school. So it is very common within the public school system, uh, depending on what state you're in, for individual public schools to reject kids with special needs all the time. Your uh local public school may not be able to meet your individualized special needs, which makes sense. It some needs, it makes sense to have schools where you can pool resources and have teachers to hire to meet those needs. And so you basically redirect those parents to those places. But I think it's really a misconception, broadly speaking, that every school should or can be open to every child rather than thinking about how to make the education system workable for families who need different options.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

I think that speaks to the the important principle that sometimes we say in school choice circles, which is that education dollars should follow students and not systems. What do we mean by that?

SPEAKER_02 21:28

Yeah, and I think it it comes back to this basic uh philosophy of when you're thinking about funding, who should we prioritize in those funding decisions? Uh and it should it be students and families that should be the primary beneficiaries of state education funding, or should it be a public school system or at one particular way of delivering education as the primary recipient? I think the challenging thing in political arguments, uh You know, if you're in a committee hearing at a state capitol, the folks who have the time and money and energy to show up for those committee hearings are people representing folks already in the system. Right. So you'll see teachers' unions, you'll see superintendent associations, you'll see principal uh associations, folks, these are all uh representatives of a system that are coming to lobby for their system. That makes sense. That's what they're hired to do. Uh for parents and kids, they are often not the ones as able to show up for those committee hearings. They don't have the money to hire lobbyists uh to fight for them in those committee hearings. And so, you know, from our perspective, I think one reason we, you know, my organization is called the American Federation for Children, is we try to give a voice to families and kids and put them at that negotiating table and say, hey, I understand there are real costs with teachers. We have to pay for health care, we have to pay good wages, we understand that. But students also need to be represented here. We should never be investing in a system over the needs of parents and their kids.

SPEAKER_01 23:02

One of the oddest arguments that opponents of school choice make is that if we give make school choice programs available, it will decrease public school enrollment and therefore threaten the whole system. How do you respond to that argument?

SPEAKER_02 23:18

Yeah, it's a great question. I uh I actually have a paper I'm working on right now about this uh very question. So I uh yeah, would love to come and talk to you about it again. I'll be I we presented it at a conference a couple weeks ago. But uh, you know, I think this is a concern. It makes sense, right? There are these new what they call universal school choice programs where every student in the state is eligible to sign up. It's not limited by disability status, income, uh geography, where you happen to live. If you are a K-12 student, you can join the program. Uh and in eight of those states, every student who applies is also guaranteed to receive funding. So Indiana is one of those. We're very lucky. So any Catholic school in Indiana can accept a kid and they can be, they can receive their state share funding, which is about 50% of what public schools receive per people all in, a lot less than what public schools receive to go to a private school. So, you know, the worry is well, this is gonna be a huge exodus from the public schools if you pass these types of problem these programs. And I think on first blush, I think I am concerned that folks are worried that there's gonna be a max exodus because you know, what is happening in public schools if there's going to be a max exodus as a result of passing these programs? That doesn't not speak to the quality of the education you're providing within public schools. And I think to reassure them, uh, you know, we have seen these programs pass in many states at this point. Uh, you know, the first program for school choice was passed in 1991. It's been a long time since then. Uh, we have not seen a total collapse of public school enrollment around the country. It has shifted a few percentage points. And, you know, what we have found in our own research is that when states expand to universal, it is a slow but you know, gradual movement of students from public schools to private and sometimes from private back to public if it's not a good fit. Maybe you had a great middle school experience, but want to go to the public high school because you want to play on the football team. Uh, and that that happens all the time. A lot of families do not stay in one sector across their whole educational journey. So, what we have found, and I think you know, focusing in on Florida, you know, Florida has had a huge bloom in school choice, uh, not just private school choice. So the you we have the big private school choice program. We also have charter schools, magnet schools. Uh, they have open enrollment where you can move between public school districts in Florida. And their public school enrollment is actually up almost a percentage point in the last five years uh since 2019, which is remarkable because most states are facing a demographic cliff and birth rates are way down, uh, particularly in large, uh typically Democrat-dominated states like California, Illinois, New York, those states have all lost more than 5% of their public school enrollment over the last five to six years since the pandemic. Uh, and they have no private school choice programs. So I think you have to really start to ask yourself, you know, what states are creating family-centric policies and which ones are not? Where are families going to want to live and raise their kids? And I think, you know, places like Florida, places like Texas that recently passed a universal choice program are demonstrating that they care about families options. They care about providing an environment where families want to live, raise kids, have kids. Um, and I think that's gonna be a huge problem for some of these states that are literally losing population.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

You preempted one of my questions that school choice is school choice could possibly be seen in the sense of a of a driver of economic growth in states and work for a workforce development program. I mean, we have we run we live in a society that's built around the management of complex systems. And when you don't have competent people to run complex systems, uh, you know, you're you're putting your whole society and your economy in long-term jeopardy. So we should see that kids are getting the educations they need to be not only principled and values-centric students and people, but also competent people as well. Um and if we just look at nape scores uh from the standpoint of what Catholic schools are doing vis-a-vis states and school districts, it's the top of the at the where the Catholic schools are at the top. So just from a competence standpoint, it seems, and a workforce development standpoint, school choice programs uh are driving uh states toward uh avoiding that demographic cliff, like Florida, like South Carolina, like some other places.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

No, that's right. I mean, I think that's a very reasonable intuition about these programs. You know, it's something we don't have good research on yet, which I we have been uh wanting and encouraging researchers to kind of pursue some of these questions. The data are challenging to track down. Uh so we're still working on that. But uh, you know, what we have found is that we know that these programs increase with college enrollment, graduation. And when they have looked at this in the state of Ohio, for example, the benefits were not only for the kids who use the program. So this was a very low-income targeted program, voucher program in Ohio that was just for kids in failing schools. Some kids switched to private schools as a result of this voucher, but most kids stayed in the public schools. And interestingly, what they found was that the public schools that those kids were coming from who were eligible but did not use the program also improved at a higher rate than schools who just barely missed that eligibility cut, uh, kind of cut score between like being a failing school and not a failing school. And so, you know, part of the theory here is that when you create a dynamic education system that encourages this kind of growth, you're helping those kids who have the opportunity, but you're also helping the public schools improve. You're kind of lighting a fire under them to say, hey, you also need to improve so that families want to continue sending their kids there. So the competitive effects of school choice are also really powerful, and I think really dovetail into that workforce argument as well.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Speaking of competitive effects, you've done a release a major new study about school choice programs in Florida where you were a teacher and the impact of when you scale up private school choice programs or school choice programs, it actually has positive benefits on public school performance as well. So say a little bit more about that important research.

SPEAKER_02 29:23

Yeah, so I put together this study. It's uh I call it a research synthesis, really, because I did not do any of the underlying research, but really wanted to bring two literatures together from the education policy world. So one of those literatures is this body of work on competitive effects, which we know now very solidly that private school choice programs in general will improve the quality of public schools around them in these high competition areas over time. So the public school kids are benefiting from the scale up of these private school choice programs. Uh, there's this another literature in the ed policy world about the effects of school spending. And a lot of times folks will come into committee hearings and they'll say, hey, you should not spend$100 million on this private school choice program. Our public schools need more funding. They're underfunded, they are not getting the resources they need. You should take that$100 million and just plop it into the public school budget. And there's been uh really high quality research, especially in the last five to 10 years, about the impact of every additional dollar that you put into public schools and the kind of uh results you can expect from that. I think the challenge is a lot of people don't realize how small that effect is on academic achievement for the additional spending for how much it costs. So it can't, you know, additional spending can work, but those marginal dollars, once you hit a certain point, uh every additional dollar you're adding is doing a lot less than the dollar that came before it. And that's a huge problem for these big public school systems that don't often know how to allocate resources very effectively. So basically in the context of Florida, what I did is I said, hey, you know, we know that the private school choice program, as it scaled up over 15 years, had these like modest and uh quite impressive competitive effects on half of the kids in public schools in the state that were in these high competition areas. It's like 1.5 million public school kids. Let's just take the cost of the scholarship program there in Florida, compared to what that same amount of money affecting the same amount of kids over that same amount of time, how much would that have gotten you in the public school system if you just said, hey, public school budgets, here you go, here's uh that same amount of funding. And you know, basically what I found was that, you know, over those 15 years, the state of Florida spent$2.8 billion on their tax credit scholarship program. That's nothing to sneeze at. I mean, it's over 15 years, but you know, substantial amount of money. Um, if you were to achieve the same academic gains for the same public school students over that same time, the state of Florida would have had to have spent$32 billion as compared to the under$3 billion for the private school choice route. So it was approximately 11 times less than the just school spending route alone. And I think it really, you know, this is a very narrow technical argument. This is not the only thing that we care about with school choice, or you know, we don't just care about test score gains. Uh, but I really want to point out, you know, if you care about academic achievement, you care about improving public school test scores, private school choice is actually an incredibly effective intervention for the public school system. Um and I think, you know, this bringing these two together really haven't been in conversation, but need to be to think about the fact that, hey, you don't need to be railing against private school programs because you think it's gonna hurt public schools. No, in fact, it's actually creating a lot of benefit for the whole system as well.

SPEAKER_01 32:46

It's driving innovation, improved performance, flexibility. So your research, dollars to donuts,$100 million toward a private school uh or school choice program uh is gonna create much higher return on investment vis-a-vis$100 million spent uh simply on a variety of things in terms of public school performance.

SPEAKER_02 33:06

That's right. Yeah, I mean, that same$100 million might be over a billion that you'd have to spend in the public school budget just to get a similar outcome. Um, right. And that's a huge, that's a huge delta. So that is something I think a lot of policy um policymakers don't often think about or think about these um kind of spillover effects uh of these programs, not just on the kids who are using it, but also the kids who are exposed to greater competition.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

Thirty years ago, when I was first exposed to school choice programs and they were in their early stages, we we you know thought this just from the standpoint of common sense, right? When you induce competition into a market for students, you're gonna drive better results for everyone. Thirty years later, now with your research and others, we actually have data that support the theory, which is super exciting for those of us who've been tilling soil in this vineyard for a long time. I just want to highlight a couple other things, though, and just in terms of the research around school choice, 26 of 29 studies show improvement in public school students' test scores after the creation of school choice programs. As of 2024, 80%, 84% of the 188 studies done on school choice programs show a net positive effect for participants in those programs across a variety of metrics, and only 6% show a negative impact. 71% of studies showed improvement in educational attainment of participants. 91% of parents who participated in programs showed satisfaction with private school options, which seems to me the best accountability mechanism is the parent. As they say, follow the science. The science seems strong. So, what's the resistance to school choice programs? And often it seems, I'll just editorialize a little bit, that it's often more about normative considerations and commitments to a system for what it does outside of the classroom more than what goes on inside the classroom and student achievement.

SPEAKER_02 34:58

Yeah, it's a great point. I think uh, you know, the evidence now is really overwhelming that school choice benefits uh students, it is benefits the broader system that it's a part of. And you know, I think you're right, there are a set of more technocratic arguments that we can have on the uh, you know, the social science of education. And, you know, I'm happy to dive in and fight some of those battles, but I think on a broader level, and I think the more important level are these set of normative uh assumptions and values that folks hold around, you know, what does it mean to fund public education in the United States? I think there's one version of that argument that says public education means funding the public schooling system, which is a government-run system of education in which dollars are made available to families only if they go to the provider, which is your local government school. I think on the other side, there's another conception of public education. I think one that's more broadly shared across the world, which is a commitment to public education, is a commitment that the public is educated and that education dollars flow to every student, regardless of who provides that education. So we can invite in civil society to provide education for kids. It doesn't just have to be the government as a uh providing that education. I mean, you can think about our hospital system, the United States, for example. Think about how many communities only have access to healthcare because there is a religious hospital in their town or city. You know, should we say, well, you should only have government-provided hospitals and services? If there is a religious hospital in your area, they should be ineligible for any government uh subsidy or benefits in order to serve people's health needs. I think in many ways, education is a similar thing. We we care about uh raising up our children, and in some ways, even more significantly, we care about educating our kids. We want our neighbors' kids to be educated. And so those dollars should follow the student, and they can then go to a nonprofit that runs schools, they can go to a religious organization that runs schools, they can go to uh, you know, in the case of charters organizations uh that are perhaps affiliated with a nonprofit or affiliated with a local school system, even. Uh, there's lots of different options, and I think we are growing in that direction, but I think the broader philosophical challenge remains because I think many people are stuck in this old paradigm. And that's, you know, that's where most people send their kids. So I think, you know, the other side politically is very good at creating fear around these programs. Uh, particularly teachers' unions, who are very politically powerful, will come and attack these programs because they know if there are fewer public school employees, that is fewer due-paying members for their uh political operations, which are significant, billions of dollars a year that they spend on politics. So that is our fundamental challenge. I mean, money in politics has always been a big problem, but uh, you know, even more so when you have these entrenched uh organizations that really refuse to change and uh become a huge stumbling block to innovation and empowering uh educational options for kids.

SPEAKER_01 38:09

What are some of the better arguments against school choice programs?

SPEAKER_02 38:15

Yeah, I would say, I mean, we are always in the process, and I think this is where my work is of how do we make these policies better. Uh, you know, I think access continues to be a really important one. If you're a low-income family, transportation is really tough. Uh, private schools don't receive, and most states, I think Minnesota, maybe they do actually, receive some money for transportation. Is that right? Or I can't remember. Yeah, that's right. Okay, so one of the few. So there are a handful of states that do provide some state funding for education, transportation. Most states don't. So that can be a big barrier to school choice, right? If you're not in an urban area where you're going to have a lot of schools around you, you're in a more rural area. How can we innovate on the policy so that way options can open up for you, even without access to uh transportation for, let's say, a 45-minute trip to school? I think a really cool thing about education savings accounts that are these newer forms of school choice, is that it actually creates funding for these types of problems and challenges. So, for example, you can uh pay for transportation out of your ESA as long as you're going to school. Uh, you can also use your ESA to uh in a number of states to fund and start a micro school. So, you know, before, if you're in a rural area, there's no private school there, you have no choice. But now you can maybe hire a public former public school teacher, start a school with 10 to 20 kids, use an ESA to help pay for that. You've created some options within that area, where before, with a traditional voucher program, there wasn't that same flexibility. So I think that's the balance we try to strike is enough flexibility that we can meet some of these very diverse needs and access challenges while still maintaining integrity around these dollars all going towards education.

SPEAKER_01 39:52

Why is it that we are very comfortable with school choice for college students and pre-K, but it seems to me that at the K-12 level, we can't we can't have school choice. So the some of the opponents of school choice are they're very fine with uh public dollars flowing to students and letting them choose their college or their pre-K program or preschool program, but not K-12. What's going on there?

SPEAKER_02 40:17

Yeah, a lot of people forget, right? We have Pell Grants at the at the college level where you can take that to, you know, you can take that to so many different religious, even private and even religious colleges on the pre-K level. It's like as soon as they hit that kindergarten door, for some reason, like the money disappears. Uh, you know, I think it really is wrapped up in the history of the United States and how we've organized our K-12 education system, as well as just where political power lies uh within the traditional public education world. So I think a lot of folks have been taught that if you pass these programs, it's gonna destroy the public school system that so many families depend on. And I think from our perspective as school choice advocates, we are not seeking to destroy the public schools. If anything, we think these programs will improve the public schools. Um, and you know, evidence has borne out in many states that it can be a huge boon to uh public education systems. So, you know, we believe that this is a clear inconsistency, should be resolved. Uh, I think we're grateful that we now have this federal tax credit that I mentioned that may open it up to many states that uh previously have not had it. But you know, the political challenge is, you know, our organization is nonpartisan. We would support Democrats or Republicans as long as you support support school choice policy. We've supported many Democrats in the past who have stepped out on this issue from kind of the party line. And immediately what happens is the party rank and file will recruit an opponent to primary you. So as soon as you step out, they say you are you've gone beyond the line of what is acceptable within our party. And even though this would benefit your constituency, maybe you are from a lower income part of the city, you know that the schools aren't good there, and your family's been talking to you about how you need more options, uh, we are still going to primary you and find somebody who can kind of fall online. So trying to open up the space of there is a version of this policy that could be supported. And I actually think that there would be really interesting and innovative policies that you could pass in blue states if there was more uh political creativity there around policy design. I don't think a school choice policy doesn't have to look exactly like what they have in Texas or Idaho. Uh, there's a lot of options here. And I, you know, it would be my hope that politicians across the country could start to uh be a little bit more creative and think, I think clearly about how to meet the needs, particularly of our lowest income students who are locked out of these choices currently.

SPEAKER_01 42:34

Yeah, it's sad to see so many legislators whose uh constituents would benefit so greatly from school choice programs oppose them simply because they are afraid, like you said, of being primaried. It used to be the case here in Minnesota that we had Democrats supporting school choice programs, but um the last time that happened, they signed on to the bills. They got calls within 24 hours that they'd be primaried and were then um removed their name from the bills. Do you see any long-term hope that school choice will become a bipartisan issue again? In the short terms, it seems it's become very, very partisan, even where those states that aren't opting into the what's essentially free money on the federal scholarship tax credit, because there's no cost to the states, states not opting in precisely because of partisanship and the fact that the scholarship tax credit was passed in the one big beautiful bill, which was signed by Donald Trump, and therefore it's terrible and we can't support it just simply because the president signed it. Do you see any hope that this partisan dynamic that's hardening on this issue is going to change in the short term or even long term?

SPEAKER_02 43:41

I hope so. I do think there is some hope on this front. Um, I think the the new federal tax credit scholarship does open up some space to say, hey, look, this is a program that can benefit private school students if they need tuition help from a scholarship organization. But I think the you know brilliant thing about the policy design is that scholarship Are also open and available to public and charter school students in those states. And so there really is a bipartisan area there. And I think what we have found interestingly is that school boards, public school community foundations, for example, tend to be very enthusiastic about the federal tax credit scholarship. And the loudest voices you hear opposing it and uh kind of spreading incorrect information about it are the teachers unions who will call it a voucher program, which it is not, because it is open to kids from all types of schools. So I think the more that we can start shaping our policy towards how do these bills and programs benefit all kids, and how can we think about the education of all the students in our state, uh, it'll I think it'll start to be more bipartisan and less of just this, you know, back and forth between the two parties. I think there's a you know shorter run, more challenges in the next couple of years. Uh, but I think if you also just look at polling, like young parents are much more in favor of these policies than uh some of our older voters uh in general. So I think, you know, folks who are millennials, folks who are younger than that, who are now having kids for the first time, they are used to having choice for all kinds of things in their life, right? The choice is something that is very native to the digital era. So I think even beyond, you know, in the past, this was very much a part of, you know, should be should religion be in schools or not? It was often posed as like this is religious schools versus public schools. I really don't think that that is or needs to be the major fault line here. Uh, particularly going forward, I think a lot of parents are gonna want options for schools for all kinds of reasons, uh, particularly even moral reasons that may or may not have to do with their religious affiliation. Uh so I think, I don't know, in my opinion, I think from the polling that we see, this is overwhelmingly possible, um popular even within the Democratic Party. And so I think over time they're just gonna have to start to recognize that.

SPEAKER_01 45:53

According to recent polling here from Ed Choice, 61% of Democrats support school choice programs in Minnesota, uh, where I'm coming from. So there is broad popularity. And people choose, want, might want school choice for a variety of reasons, not simply because they want to attend, uh, have their kit child send to attend a Catholic school. It might be because they want to start a micro school. We've had Jewish and Islamic testifiers on school choice who want both moral safety and physical safety in a time of increasing uh religious bigotry as well. So there's a variety of reasons why people might want school choice program. And the great thing is that uh it spurs innovation, it spurs options. And ESAs, like you're saying, are kind of school choice 2.0 or maybe even 3.0. They don't have the, they've got more flexibility than a voucher program that requires you to send a kid to a brick and mortar school.

SPEAKER_02 46:42

That's right. Yeah. So I think I very exciting future, in my opinion. I think the uh the new federal tax credit, I think, is very underappreciated. Folks don't realize how much of a difference it might make, uh especially to meet some of those critical gaps across the sectors. So special education services is a classic one. I mean, everyone talks about the fact that we just don't have enough funding to fully meet the needs of kids with special needs. And, you know, I think a large chunk of the uh scholarship organizations will eventually be devoted to helping solve this problem. And I think it's a really innovative way to do that in a more choice-centric policy type.

SPEAKER_01 47:15

The statistic here, if if enough if 30% of the people eligible in Minnesota to receive that$1,700 credit, which is a credit right on your tax liability, which is a great benefit. Um, and everyone can get it. Even if your state doesn't opt in, you could donate to another state that has a scholarship granting organization. But recent statistics and speculation is that even if 30% of eligible filers in Minnesota opted in and took that credit, they could get it would generate almost$487 million for educational achievement in our state, just with 30% opting in. So it really could be a game changer, like you said, not just for kids in private schools, but also kids in public schools as well. And so we're trying to hammer that message here in Minnesota. But I think it's a tremendous opportunity for everyone across sectors and something we should be jumping into. There is conservative opposition to school choice programs from homeschoolers sometimes and from people in the private school community who believe that um those dollars, if if you're to accept students who receive those scholarships or ESAs, they're gonna come with strings that are gonna impact mission. How do you respond to some of those concerns uh from on what might be called more conservative opposition to school choice programs?

SPEAKER_02 48:31

Yeah, I think this is an important thing to worry about. And I don't disagree that it is something that we have to constantly be vigilant about, regardless of the institution within the Catholic Church, for example, right? We we know our hospitals have been affected by this. We know that uh many other charity organizations have been, you know, adoption services have been affected by this. And I think at one level, we know that our protections for religious liberty and free exercise are very strong in this country. And uh fortunately, we've had a string, and particularly in the school choice world, of Supreme Court decisions over the last five years that have continually reaffirmed that right and have strengthened it over time. So we have at no point been in a better position than we are now in terms of legal precedent for protecting schools' religious liberty and their identity for participating in these programs. I think on a policy level, for most of the organizations involved with crafting school choice policy, ours included, one of the fundamental things that we include in every single one of these bills is strong private school autonomy protections, which include religious liberty protections. So we have never seen uh a case of schools being unfairly targeted because of their religious status, particularly on these issues uh related to students participating because of these strong protections that are in these bills. And so I would never want private schools to have to uh, you know, moderate their faith in some way or you know, think about how they would have to uh become more like the state and less like who they are because of participating. And I think it's a battle we're gonna have to continue to fight as long as we remain in public life. And I think my challenge really is we should not be withdrawing from the public sphere. We need to be a part of advocating for our rights as uh citizens as well as religious people in the United States. And part of that is through these programs to say, uh, you know, this we are part of the pluralism that makes up the great United States, and you know, we deserve access to this as well. So um, you know, I think on the homeschool side, I think there has also been concerns there, and I definitely understand that. And I think we also go to great lengths in a lot of our policies to really define uh participating in something like an ESA. You become an ESA student. You are no longer a homeschool student within the state, kind of under that legal definition. And what that does is you will always have, you will have that homeschool category, and that is protected. Anything that applies to an ESA student. So, for example, in some states, they require an ESA student, even if you're homeschooling, to take a uh some kind of standardized assessment every year. So, not the state test necessarily, but like a nationally norm reference test, like a lot of folks might be familiar with, like the Iowa test or uh something like that, right? Um, so you'd be required to do that as an ESA student. You are not required. That doesn't change anything about you being a homeschool student. So it's an opt-in. You decide, are I see what the requirements are, it might require me to submit these test scores to the state once a year. If you say that's acceptable to me as a parent, uh you can opt in and choose to receive that funding. If not, great, that's fine. You can continue to homeschool. And I think we have always been very careful and clear that uh these programs are distinct from those kind of traditional homeschooling options.

SPEAKER_01 51:49

If you like your public school, you can keep it. If you are concerned about uh strings being attached to ESA dollars, don't participate in the program. Uh schools are not obliged to participate in the ESA program or any of these school choice programs. So it does maintain that degree of flexibility. And it speaks to an important point that in school choice programs, dollars follow, they do indeed follow the students, and that speaks to why they've been upheld at a constitutional level. Oftentimes the the rhetoric is that we can't be funding private schools, for example. But in school choice programs, private schools aren't funded directly, they're in fact uh funding parents and not systems. Say more about that.

SPEAKER_02 52:33

Yeah, and actually, this is it's very relevant to this question because uh, you know, not all school choice policies are the same, as we've kind of talked about. There's lots of different types. So some of them will come with more requirements for participating private schools and participating students. Come, some come with many fewer. And sometimes the number of dollars that flow to students uh to funding students is different depending on the number of requirements. And I think, you know, families, schools can decide like what is the level of uh requirements and uh you know different things I'll have to meet for the state. What am I willing to opt into? So, you know, in a state like Indiana, we have a voucher. Those tend to be a little bit more rigorous in terms of what they require of the school, the school has to be accredited, the school in Indiana and specifically has to offer the state test. So you don't have an option on which test to take. A lot of private schools don't like that. And that's that's totally fine. You don't have to participate in that program if you don't like that. But Indiana also has a state tax credit scholarship. And those are uh, I think historically less regulated, if you will, than like something like a voucher program, because those are private dollars that are being donated, which you then receive a tax credit for from the state. And, you know, there's fewer of those dollars going into schools, but schools can still benefit uh from those dollars and uh, you know, not as much, but can still benefit and not have to compromise on something like I don't want to give the state test at our school. Um and I think that that's you know, I think that's a fair compromise. I think, you know, in many places, what we will probably end up seeing is there will be some programs where if you're willing to kind of meet a number of academic quality benchmarks where you say we're gonna be accredited, we take some kind of standardized test, uh, we will verify this kind of financial information to show that our school is long-term viable and submit that to the state. Uh, that's true in a number of choice programs, you're gonna get a dollar amount that's much closer to the full funding for a student. Whereas there might be other options available to you, like this new federal tax credit scholarship, where maybe a student is receiving a$3,000 scholarship and it's just a handful of students at your schools, but everything is flowing through that scholarship organization that makes decisions about that. So I really don't think it needs to be an all or nothing. I don't think you have to be completely opposed to school choice if you're very worried about these regulations. I think it's more about thinking about what are the bounds and the types of school choice programs that would work for us given our commitments.

SPEAKER_01 54:57

Who make the best advocates for school choice programs in your experience?

SPEAKER_02 55:02

I mean, it's the recipients. I mean, I think it's one of the best things about uh being in the movement now is seeing kids that have gone through elementary, middle school, and high school and are now in college and beyond that benefited from some of these original voucher programs. So uh, you know, we have a number of folks that actually work for our organization who have gone up through uh voucher programs like in Ohio or tax credit scholarship programs like in Florida, and have just talked about the fact that they would not have been in college if it were not for this program. Uh and now they're you know working in public policy, trying to shape these programs around the country. Um, and I think, you know, Texas is a great example of this. You know, one of the champions that helped pass the Texas ESA bill this past year, this is a billion-dollar ESA program. Texas is a very large state. Um, he was a recipient of the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship and can speak to that reality of, you know, my family didn't have options until someone presented this and said, Hey, you should think about this other school because it looks like you need something. Um, so I think that that has been really powerful for me, thinking about my own students and you know, their ability to be within uh Catholic schools in particular has been very powerful. And Florida itself has seen a huge growth in Catholic school enrollment and Catholic schools in general. Uh, they've added a ton of private schools. Catholic schools across the state are full. So we know the demand is there uh if they had access to funding for it. And I think that that is the real challenge for a lot of other places. It's you know, so many of our Catholic schools are sitting empty or closing, not necessarily because no one wants to send their kids there. It's because they are being shut out from funding for their kid that is at the state level, it's their uh, you know, I think it's their right as a you know child of the state to have access to education funding.

SPEAKER_01 56:44

Uh, and we should really be thinking about how to help all kids. What can the church do in states, irrespective of what kind of choice programs they have, to become better advocates for school choice programs, creating more access to these programs, both at the institutional church level and individual Catholics specifically, what can we do to continue to move the needle to expand access to these programs nationwide?

SPEAKER_02 57:08

Yeah, I think on the short term, for states that have not opted into this new federal tax credit scholarship, so there's about 30 that have opted in or signaled that they will opt in. There's a remaining 20 that are almost all states with governors that are with Democrat governors. And I think many of those Democrat governors actually will opt in. I think they will see how important this will be for education across the state. But hearing from their constituency, hearing from our Catholic bishops, hearing from parents, especially if you are considering yourself uh part of the Democrat Party, right? If you identify as and vote Democrat, but support school choice, there's a lot of them. Uh, please go out and talk to your uh talk to your bishop, talk to your representatives and say, hey, I need you to speak to the folks in the governor's mansion. I need you to speak to the folks in uh across the state about the importance of this program and how much it would mean to us. Uh, and there are a number of Democrat organizations that support these policies as well. So Democrats for Education Reform has become a really notable one, advocating for opt-in. And I would love for the church to really start thinking about how do we set up scholarship organizations to help serve schools and then demonstrate the great benefits it's delivering to kids as a result of fundraising that money. And, you know, this can happen across the board. This can happen at the parish level, this can happen at uh kind of your diocesan level in terms of setting up these scholarship organizations, starting to do that work now. The program starts in 2027. So we're about six months away. And uh, you know, my hope is even for those states that have not opted in, so my you know, grew up in California, not anticipating they will opt in in the first year, maybe year two or year three. But I've already heard stories of uh diocese or other Catholic school foundations wanting to start an SGO in California, fundraising from their parishioners, right? It costs them nothing. It's a one-to-one credit. It's either you give it for a scholarship or you pay that to your federal taxes. And then giving scholarships to kids in Catholic schools in states that have opted in. So you're in California, you give your gift, and you know, you maybe pick out a group of Catholic schools in Utah and say, we would really love to support low-income students in Utah who want access to a Catholic education in the Diocese of Salt Lake. And you can demonstrate to the state of California and say, hey, look at all this money that could be serving California students uh that is leaving, literally leaving your state uh as a result of this program while also benefiting those students in other states. So, you know, I think that's kind of an uh innovative, interesting way to kind of apply some pressure and just show what's possible. And then, you know, I think when the state does opt in, you would already have the infrastructure ready to go to uh hit the ground running for your own students.

SPEAKER_01 59:52

You can pay that$1,700 of the federal government or you can donate it to a scholarship granting organization that's moving the needle for uh kids to attain greater educational outcomes and opportunities. It's it's a no-brainer. I'll be uh, despite the fact we aren't going to be, at least in the short term, opting in here in Minnesota. If we don't, I'll be sending my money to us another state for sure because this is such a fantastic program. And it's hard to see why states wouldn't opt in other than just politics and sheer spite. Patrick, where can people go to learn more about you and your research at American Federation for Children?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:29

Yes, yeah, look us up, uh federationforchildren.org. Uh the we've got a link to the my recent study on the website, and that we also had an article come out in uh Ednext, which is uh education publication uh called School Choice or School Spending. So yeah, also check that out because it's a nice overview of the study. And uh yeah, other than that, I think yeah, grateful for folks' support of uh these policies and feel free to reach out at any time.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:54

Well, we could we just scratched the surface on this important topic, and you're one of the best uh to talk about it with. So we're so grateful you joined us on uh Catholic in America, Patrick Graff. Thanks so much for joining us and God bless you and your work. Awesome. Thanks so much, Jason. From its institutional beginnings in the United States, the Catholic Church has always fought the state's monopoly on education. Formerly, it was because it sought to indoctrinate students as good Protestants and good Americans and not as good Catholics, but it was really based in the principle that the family truly is the first educator, that parents are the first educator of the children. And school systems, whether be private and parochial or public, they exist to help the parents in the education of the children and take on uh responsibilities and teaching opportunities and educational opportunities that families can't do themselves. Thus, education in whatever form is an act of subsidiarity, whether that's C C D programs at a church or, for example, sending your kid to a Catholic school, or even when the state offers a public school education. So it's really subsidiarity in that the state or some higher body comes in and supports the work of parents as first educators. But from the Catholic perspective, education should be student-centric and not system-centric. We need to fund and support the parents in the role of educating each child in his or her unique needs. Therefore, in Catholic teaching and Catholic social teaching, we just have to say the state has an affirmative duty to support parents in that role, to give children an education that A is helps them flourish from a technical standpoint, but also from a spiritual moral standpoint. The church understands that education truly is formation of the person. It's formation of mind and character, not just filling them with information. Students aren't uh cookie-cutter uh kids, and we don't shouldn't use a factory model of education. We should give students the opportunity to find an education that serves their needs. That's why school choice programs, in fact, are so important, is because those to take a portion of that state funding for education and it follows the student and doesn't go to a generic system where the students can sometimes get lost. So there's a lot of reasons why people would choose school choice programs because they want to leave an underperforming school that's not serving them academically. They want a school that serves their values, they want safety. Sometimes schools are simply not safe physically for students. Religious minorities sometimes want a place where they have safety as well because they're discriminated against. So we see that there's a lot of reasons why people want school choice programs. We say school choice is for everybody, um, no matter what your unique needs are, but really focusing in our education finance mechanisms on funding students more than funding systems overall. So really exciting to see the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit come online. Lots of states have robust school choice programs, some more than others. Uh here in Minnesota, certainly we're still when we're with one of the pioneers in education choice programs in the 70s and 80s and early 1990s. We've since fallen behind our neighbors. And so it's an ongoing debate, but one in which the church is playing a critical role locally but in the states, but also nationally as well. Let's get involved with your state Catholic Conference and their Catholic advocacy networks to see how you can support school choice programs, but really an imperative from our Catholic social teaching principles. I hope this has been a valuable and informative discussion, making sense of the school choice debate and what's going on. We're so grateful to Dr. Graff, one of the real great uh emerging leaders in the school choice landscape. Grateful to have him and his witness and his experience on the program today. Thank you for giving us uh your generous time to form yourself in this really, really important and core issue, uh, helping the family be the first educator of each child. I'm Jason Adkins, thanking you for joining us on Catholic in America, and looking forward to connecting with you again on future podcasts. God bless you, and again, thanks for listening.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:59

Take care.com.