Five Things To Know About Second-Year Participation In Indiana's Voucher Program

Elle Moxley / StateImpact Indiana

Students sing and play music games during choir class at St. Charles Catholic School in Bloomington.

The number of students attending private school using state-funded tuition vouchers doubled this year. Next year there’s no cap on the number of students who can apply, which makes Indiana’s program one of the fastest growing in the country.

We don’t know yet which private schools saw an enrollment boost thanks to vouchers during the 2012-13 school year, but we have crunched the numbers on the public school districts students have left.

Here are five takeaways from the 2012-13 voucher data:

1. Related

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   Topics

   So You Want To Go To Private School?

   What are School Vouchers?

   Forty-four school districts have students participating in the voucher program for the first time. Of these corporations, Kokomo-Center Township Consolidated had the most students leave for private schools with 17 vouchers.
2. More than 100 school corporation saw at least twice as many students participate this year as last year. The number of students from North Lawrence Community Schools participating jumped from four last year to 40 this year, a 900 percent increase.
3. Half of the 207 school corporations had fewer than 10 students receive vouchers. Just 21 school districts had more than 100.
4. Indianapolis Public Schools again had the most students receive vouchers, 1,262. But joining it at the top were Fort Wayne, South Bend, Evansville Vanderburgh and Hammond. That’s a slightly different list than last year, when Anderson and Gary were Nos. 4 and 5, respectively.
5. Not every school corporation saw increased participation in the voucher program. Six districts actually have fewer students receiving vouchers this year than last: Nineveh-Hesley-Jackson United, North Daviess, Smith-Green, Northeast Dubois County, Southern Hancock County and Northwestern Consolidated. Fourteen districts had the same number of students participate in 2011-12 as they did this year.

WEDNESDAY: StateImpact will be in Indianapolis as the Indiana Supreme Court hears oral arguments in a challenge to the state’s voucher law. Follow @ellemoxley and @StateImpactIN for updates.