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The Issues
Your tax dollars are funding religious schools that discriminate against kids
Vermont has a school voucher program that allows public tax payer money to flow to private and religious schools. If you live in a town that does not operate a school, those tax dollars can be used to send students to another school almost anywhere. They can go to another public school in Vermont but they can also go to a private school or religious school anywhere in the world.
Estimates from the Vermont Agency of Education show that over $57 million of taxpayer funds went to private and religious schools in the 2024 school year. Because our Education Fund is a shared pool of money your tax dollars are supporting this, no matter where you live in Vermont.
But that $57 million isn’t subject to the same set of rules and regulations that our public schools need to abide by. Private schools can - and do - pick and choose which students they will accept, skirting anti discrimination laws by saying that the student wasn't the “right fit”. Even worse, religious schools are openly stating that they won’t abide by Vermont’s antidiscrimination rules while happily taking the funds:
But Mid Vermont Christian insists it has the right to act in accordance with its religious beliefs, regardless of those policies. For example, as part of its January 2023 application for "approved" status, the school was required to sign a document saying it would comply with the Vermont Public Accommodations Act "in all aspects of the school's admissions and operations." That law states, in part, that schools cannot deny services based on "race, creed, color, national origin, marital status, sex, sexual orientation or gender identity."
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Vicky Fogg, Mid Vermont's head of school, signed the document — but added a typed caveat below it.
"As a religious organization, the school has a statutory and Constitutional right to make decisions based on its religious beliefs, including hiring and disciplining employees, associating with others, and in its admissions, conduct, and operations policies and procedures," the statement reads. "By signing this form, the Mid Vermont Christian School does not waive any such right."
So right now, your public tax dollars are going to religious schools that openly discriminate against students and discriminate in hiring. A clear violation of Vermont's Public Accommodations Act;
(a) An owner or operator of a place of public accommodation or an agent or employee of such owner or operator shall not, because of the race, creed, color, national origin, marital status, sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity of any person, refuse, withhold from, or deny to that person any of the accommodations, advantages, facilities, and privileges of the place of public accommodation.
But wait, it gets worse...
Vermont has a compelled support clause in the State Constitution. It says;
That all persons have a natural and unalienable right, to worship Almighty God, according to the dictates of their own consciences and understandings, as in their opinion shall be regulated by the word of God; and that no person ought to, or of right can be compelled to attend any religious worship, or erect or support any place of worship, or maintain any minister, contrary to the dictates of conscience, nor can any person be justly deprived or abridged of any civil right as a citizen, on account of religious sentiments, or peculia[r] mode of religious worship; and that no authority can, or ought to be vested in, or assumed by, any power whatever, that shall in any case interfere with, or in any manner control the rights of conscience, in the free exercise of religious worship. Nevertheless, every sect or denomination of christians ought to observe the sabbath or Lord’s day, and keep up some sort of religious worship, which to them shall seem most agreeable to the revealed will of God.
So right now, the state of Vermont is violating its own Constitution and the Governor, the Agency of Education, the State Board of Education and the Legislature are all just letting it happen.
Ready To Join Us?
We need your voice to help us change this. We need you talking to your neighbors, friends and family about this. We need you talking to your Representatives and Senators in Montpelier, letting them know that this is not acceptable. We need you to attend meetings of the State Board of Education and let them know that religious schools of any sort should not be approved to receive public tax dollars. We need you to reach out to Zoie Saunders and the Agency of Education and let them know that all schools need to comply with our state's anti-discrimination laws.