Daniel mejia

What Will the Protect Education Initiative Do? Arizona educators, parents, students, and community members have launched a citizens’ initiative called Protect Education, aiming to collect 256,000 valid signatures to put the measure on the November 2026 ballot. Find out what the Protect Education Initiative will do (and what it won’t do) by reading our newest […]

A Case Study on Arizona’s Universal ESA Voucher Program Analysis & Summary Introduction Save Our Schools Arizona Network is committed to ensuring that all children in Arizona have the opportunity to attain an excellent education at a free, inclusive public school in their local community. In order to realize this goal, we urge our state

Your 2025 Ballot: A Guide to School Bonds and Overrides This November, 36 school districts across Arizona are going out for special bond, override, and budget increase measures. But what are “bonds” and “overrides”? With ballots already mailed out across the state, it’s more important now than ever for voters to educate themselves on the

Vouchers Aren’t Free: Who’s Footing the Bill? Voucher pushers like to say the money “follows the child” and argue that vouchers “save taxpayers money,” but after three years of universal vouchers in Arizona we know that vouchers aren’t free — and the impacts are costing kids and families, as universal ESA vouchers have destabilized Arizona’s

Federal Budget, Federal Vouchers, and US Dept Funding Freezes — What’s the Impact on K-12 Schools? Public schools around the country have been thrown into uncertainty and chaos as threats of federal funding cuts have become a reality. The congressional budget passed last week makes massive cuts to Medicaid and SNAP, which will limit services

Federal Private School Voucher Program Aims to Privatize & Dismantle Public Education This week, Congress will hear the long-awaited federal voucher program called “Qualified Elementary and Secondary Education Scholarships” — formerly known as “ECCA” — in the US House Ways & Means Committee. The federal voucher program is designed as a tax credit voucher, which

Are Universal Vouchers Causing School Closures in Arizona? Arizona’s decades-long refusal to adequately fund public education and its $1 billion universal ESA voucher program are creating large budget shortfalls for districts across Arizona — and many are responding with draconian measures like school closures. As ESA voucher costs grow and school closures mount, the connection

What Does the US Dept. of Education DO — And Why Does it Matter? In recent weeks, the Trump administration has made moves to dismantle the US Dept. of Education. The newly confirmed US Secretary of Education Linda McMahon called doing so the “final mission” of the department on her very first day. But what

Arizona’s Universal ESA Vouchers Are Welfare For the Wealthy Arizona’s universal ESA voucher program, once touted as a solution for educational inequity, has instead become a coupon for the affluent, diverting hundreds of millions in taxpayer dollars away from the public schools on which low-income families continue to rely. In 2022, after nearly a decade

Your 2024 Ballot: A Guide to Voting on Propositions Arizonans’ November ballots will contain 13 statewide questions labeled as “Propositions.” Normally, ballots contain just a handful of these measures, but this year the state legislature placed 11 measures on the ballot . Learn more about those measures here. In addition to the usual swath of

Your 2024 Ballot: A Guide to Voting on Arizona Judges Like any branch of government, Arizona’s judiciary plays a critical role in supporting public education — and in upholding Arizona’s Constitution, which requires the legislature to maintain a “general and uniform” public education system. Arizonans’ unique ability to choose whether or not to retain judges,

Your 2024 Ballot: A Guide to Bonds and Overrides It’s more important now than ever for voters to educate themselves on the local ballot measures that fund our local public schools, typically called “bonds,” “overrides,” and “budget continuations” in Arizona. Ballots will be mailed across Arizona on Wednesday, October 9. The Importance of School Funding

Voucher Accounts Balloon as State Budget Starves In June, Arizona lawmakers slashed funding for K-12 public schools, higher education, water and transportation due to an ongoing budget crisis driven by universal vouchers and tax cuts for the rich. Lawmakers refused to touch the ESA voucher program despite the fact that hundreds of millions of dollars

1 in 10 K-12 Dollars Funding Vouchers in AZ New voucher funding numbers show staggering inequalities in how Arizona’s K-12 dollars are allocated, revealing that 1 in every 10 of Arizona’s K-12 state aid dollars are now funding vouchers.  Supt. Horne recently released new numbers from the Arizona Department of Education (ADE) breaking down the

As States Reject Unpopular Voucher Schemes, Billionaires Try to Buy Off Lawmakers Across the nation, state policymakers are watching Arizona’s costly, out-of-control voucher fiasco balloon and, in turn, rejecting similar schemes in their states. Despite a flood of millions in spending from pro-voucher lobbyists and billionaire donors, lawmakers — and the public — continue to

Governor Tim Walz: A Champion for Public Education Democratic presidential contender Kamala Harris has tapped Minnesota governor Tim Walz as her vice presidential pick. Now public education advocates around the country are celebrating Walz’s K-12 record and shared vision for supporting public schools that are under attack by his opposition. Education advocates across the US

What Do We Know About Kamala Harris’ Vision for Public Schools? As Democrats consolidate around Vice President Kamala Harris as the front-runner for  their presidential contender, education advocates around the country are looking into Harris’ K-12 record to glean her vision for a future for our public schools that are under attack in America.  With

Project 2025: The Far Right’s Plan to Dismantle Public Schools (and Our Democracy) As our nation approaches the November election, a playbook issued by extremists guiding the Republican party and Donald Trump has come to light. The impacts of this playbook on K-12 education in Arizona and across the US cannot be understated — beginning

Vouchers & Christian Nationalism: The Agenda to Dismantle Public Education As vouchers come under scrutiny across the US, their ties to dangerous Christian nationalist organizations are being revealed. It’s no surprise that far-right billionaires are pushing vouchers — but now it’s becoming more clear why that’s the case. CNN recently released an in-depth investigation into

Universal Voucher Cost Equals HALF of AZ’s Budget Deficit A shocking new report confirms that universal ESA voucher costs are driving the state’s massive budget deficit — responsible for half of this year’s deficit and two-thirds of next year’s. The nonpartisan Grand Canyon Institute (GCI) recently released a shocking new report showing that the projected net

Arizona’s Voucher Program is the Least Accountable in the US With zero standards for financial transparency, academic performance, or student safety, Arizona has become a cautionary tale for other states considering voucher expansion. The Arizona legislature’s repeated refusal to enact necessary reforms has left students, families, and taxpayers vulnerable. Arizona’s universal ESA voucher program stands

When Religious Extremists Take Over, Vouchers Rule and Bodily Freedom Dies Arizonans are reeling after the April 9th Arizona Supreme Court decision to abolish nearly all abortions in the state, reinstating a Civil War-era law and giving Arizona one of the strictest bans on freedom and autonomy in the US. But what does this have

“Ghost Students”: ESA Voucher Fraud Scandal Attorney General Kris Mayes continues to investigate waste, fraud, and abuse in the ESA voucher program. She decried the Legislature for creating a law with so few safeguards for state money: “I believe it is high time for the Legislature to put regulations in place to prevent the fraud

AZ Lawmakers Propose Major ESA Voucher Reforms In the first three weeks of the legislative session, Governor Katie Hobbs and various pro-public school lawmakers have introduced a wide array of ESA voucher reform bills that will keep students safe, raise standards for voucher school teachers, protect the rights of students with disabilities, and provide financial

Universal Vouchers: The Verdict Is In   As national attention turns to Arizona’s disastrous universal ESA voucher scheme, a slew of new reports outline the data behind the program. Their findings are clear: universal vouchers utterly fail to live up to the claims of the special interests peddling them. All eyes are on Arizona as

Arizona Voters Oppose Universal Vouchers & Demand Increased K-12 Funding According to a new, comprehensive poll of likely Arizona voters conducted by Stand for Children Arizona, Arizona voters are increasingly rejecting unaccountable private school vouchers and seeing the need for increased K-12 funding for local public schools that accept and serve all children.  Majority of

Arizona Ranks 49th in K-12 Funding, Again This week, the Education Law Center released its annual “Making the Grade” report, which analyzes and ranks public education funding across the states. Once again, Arizona is listed nearly last in per-pupil funding and dead last in funding effort. Only Idaho funds their public schools worse, with Arizona

Bond and Override Fact vs. Fiction The misinformation campaign around bonds, overrides, and budget continuations is in full swing. Don’t let the falsehoods distract you from supporting Arizona kids by returning your ballot by Oct. 31 with a YES vote. The November 7, 2023 election may be considered an “off” election to some — but

Wasteful Misspending of ESA Voucher Funds Shocks Arizona A shocking investigative report from ABC15 shows how Arizona taxpayer dollars are being misspent in the ESA voucher program — from ski trips to luxury car driving lessons, these purchases are all approved by the universal ESA voucher program. http://www.sosaznetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/30-Sec-ESA-Ad.mp4 ABC 15’s “Data Guru” Garrett Archer and