Wisconsin has spent some $139 million on vouchers in the past decade to pay tuition for students attending private schools that were eventually disqualified from the state’s program, according to a review by the Wisconsin State Journal.
The newspaper reports that slightly more than 50 low-performing public schools in Milwaukee, where no more than 10 percent of students tested proficient on state exams, cost the taxpayers about $360 million last year alone. Wisconsin—the birthplace of modern vouchers—denied vouchers to 50 private schools for failing to meet requirements related to financing, auditing, accreditation, and student safety. More than two-thirds of those schools had been open for no more than five years.
