1. United States
2. Texas
3. Letter

Please vote no to SB2. 1 Billion dollars to prove education is absurd. I checked the tuition for ascension academy in Amarillo, and it costs $14,250 per student plus all of the other costs associated with education ie. supplies, uniforms ($200), and extra curricular activities. On top of this, a family has to do their own transportation to and from school. My family middle class with 1 child and there is absolutely no way we could still swing this with the voucher program. I don’t see how it would benefit anyone other than the upper classes except for rare instances. In addition, I oppose public tax dollars being spent for private education as a principle. Public money should never fund private interests like this. The 1 billion dollars would be much more beneficial to invest in the public education that is struggling. Updating dilapidated schools such as Austin middle school, or provide funding to those that are having to close as AISD has announced a few are closing here. Class size ratios are already high. My daughter’s 1st grade class had to send out a notice this year that they had to request an exception to go over the set size in Olsen Elementary. Closing schools will just exacerbate the issues that are already in our community. If you’re on social media, I’ve seen a flood of posts from education professionals speaking out against this and that the Teachers Union likely won’t endorse anyone who votes in favor of SB2. I assume this could be a sizable amount of your constituents. Please represent your community in this vote rather than the political powers that are pushing this bad “emergency” bill.