DN Editorial: Who gets the credit for this?

A PROGRAM that gives generous tax credits for donations to scholarship programs for low-income students to attend private and parochial schools may strike some as a laudatory way to equalize educational opportunities. Some might even say that the Educational Improvement Tax Credit program is a way to address the civil-rights wrongs of a public system that leaves too many poor and minority children behind, while the privileged few who can afford to send kids to more expensive private schools get an unfair leg up.

One of the architects of the state-administered EITC program, state Sen. Anthony Hardy Williams, has made that civil-rights case in promoting it.

According to a report on Philly.com's Next Mayor site, some of Williams' major campaign backers for his mayoral run are also some of the EITC program's biggest donors, with the principals of Susquehanna International Group contributing up to $21 million to EITC.

In theory, the program expands the choices for students, especially those who can't afford private and parochial tuitions. But under its current framework, it's hard to see it as anything but a way to funnel public dollars into private education - with no accountability for how effectively those dollars are being spent.

The EITC program has been around for 14 years. It gives tax credits of 75 percent to 90 percent for donations for scholarship or educational programs, far more generous than other state tax-credit programs. In fiscal year 2013-14, the program awarded 53,000 scholarships on donations of $127 million. Given how little oversight is given to the program, that is close to a full summary of what we know.

We do know that calling this a program aimed at leveling the playing field for low-income students is being overly generous. According to the Department of Community and Economic Development, which administers the program, students are eligible if they are members of a family with an annual household income of not more than $75,000, with an additional income allowance of $15,000 for each child. In other words, the income level for a two-parent household with one child is $90,000 a year; with two children, it's $105,000. That's hardly low-income.

Unfortunately, we don't know the actual income levels of scholarship recipients: Are most of them below $50,000? $75,000? $100,000? How many are minority students? We don't know how many students went to private vs. parochial schools, how well the students did in those schools or if in fact they completed their education using the scholarships - or if at all.

In fact, given all that we don't know, it's hard to see this program as anything but a public giveaway to private and parochial schools, with no questions asked and no proof of effectiveness. In fact, the Legislature has banned the DCED from asking for this information from participating scholarship organizations. Why?

Gov. Wolf has kept the funding level for this program at $100 million, with $50 million for a similar program.

That means $150 million diverted from public schools. Whatever you think about public education, such schools do report on test scores, attendance, graduation rates and other performance data.

The myth of EITC is that it provides more choices for students. But if such schools are not required to provide information about how these students do, or if they fare better than their public-school counterparts, that's not a choice - it's a blind leap of faith that the public is being asked to bankroll.