Private School Voucher Toolkit

This toolkit contains resources that you and your organization can use to advocate for public schools and against vouchers with elected leaders and business/community leaders. It includes sample resolutions, letters, links to social media images, and links to data so you can pull together your own materials. This is a work in progress; you can reach us at [email protected] with questions and suggestions on how to improve.

Voucher talking points.

These are quick facts you can use when introducing the topic of vouchers and how they harm public education and communities.

    • Private school vouchers take taxpayer dollars away from public schools by using state funds on private school tuition and other expenses rather than on public education.
    • Private schools are unaccountable and virtually unregulated in North Carolina. Unlike public schools, which must follow extensive laws and regulations, private schools have very few restrictions or quality controls. (See our comparison chart)
    • Vouchers have no clear academic benefit. Research has shown no academic gains for students who use vouchers and has shown huge declines for students who use vouchers to leave public school and attend private school, especially low-income students.
    • Vouchers do not protect the rights of students with disabilities. Unlike public schools, private schools do not have to follow laws protecting vulnerable students on the basis of disability, religious belief, and sexual orientation. In North Carolina, students and families who use vouchers have to waive their civil rights, while public schools must provide services for students with disabilities for free.
    • Vouchers disproportionately harm rural families and communities. North Carolina’s vouchers primarily go to families in urban counties such as Wake, Mecklenburg, and Guilford. Rural public schools lose out on resources that are being spent in urban areas since many rural counties in North Carolina have few or no private school options.
    • Vouchers subsidize wealthy families while public schools are faced with staffing shortages and budget cuts. Families making more than $267,000/year in North Carolina qualify for $3,658/student in voucher tuition funds in 2025-26. As one private school parent said of the vouchers, “We’re able to take more family vacations…”

Contact legislators

The most direct action you can take is to contact and mobilize others to contact their state legislators to urge them to fund public schools instead of vouchers. If citizens voice their strong support for public schools and remind legislators of our public schools’ critical role in healthy communities, they are more likely to fully fund public schools. Legislators are most responsive to communication from the people in their districts. We have created sample letters (Found on our Engage: Contact Elected Officials page) that will be sent to your representatives based on your address.

  • Contact other elected leaders such as school board members, county commissioners, and PTA, business and civic leaders to urge them to contact state legislators also. This is a community problem and needs a coordinated local campaign.
    • The NC Association of County Commissioners’ website includes a tool that takes you to each county’s government page where you can find updated information on your county commissioners. Scroll down to the state map and click on your county to find your commissioners.

Write an opinion piece or letter to the editor to your local news media

Raise awareness of the voucher scheme and the damage it will cause to the local community by sharing information through your local media. Community members often don’t know about important legislation such as private school voucher expansion that, if not stopped, will impact whole communities. 

For example, in 91 of North Carolina’s 100 counties, the local school district is one of the top three employers in the county. Defunding and damaging public schools could have a devastating impact on the local economy including its labor force and tax rate.

Encourage your school board (and others) to pass a resolution opposing vouchers. 

A resolution is a statement of the will or opinion of an elected body.  As the governing body of our schools and stewards of tax dollars, a resolution sends a clear statement to our state lawmakers that our school districts want legislators to reject voucher expansion and instead to pass legislation with full, permanent funding of our public schools. 

Gather other public school advocates to sign a petition in support of the resolution and speak about it at a board meeting. Our NC Public Education Network lists pro-public education organizations in each county and statewide to help you grow your network.

In North Carolina, county commissions have local taxing authority and are responsible for funding school districts. When the state fails to fund schools, county commissioners must bridge the gap. In many communities, the local tax base is not strong enough to make up for the state’s lack of funding and schools suffer greatly. Your county commissioners and city government can and should also pass resolutions in support of your school district and against vouchers. The North Carolina Association of County Commissioners website has links to each county and its members.

Many school boards in North Carolina have already passed resolutions against vouchers. School boards are already working hard to provide a strong public education for our children without the funds they need–voucher expansion will only make it more difficult.

If your school board has not passed a resolution, you can use one of the examples below to create one for your district and ask school board members to sign on. Before the school board’s next meeting, send it to board members and then speak about the resolution during the public comment period. 

Sample resolution: Resolution to Prioritize Public Schools

Sample resolution: Resolution Opposing Vouchers

Share our infographics to help inform everyone about vouchers in North Carolina.

Use our data and share social media graphics

Connect with other public school supporters in your county and across the state

NC Public Education Network is a resource to help connect people who are passionate about public schools. Click on a county to get county-specific organizations. Find more organizations by clicking on NC Statewide Organization and National/Other State Organizations.

Meet with Your Legislators: A Step-by-Step Advocacy Visit Guide

  1. Who are you meeting with and what do they care about? 
    1. What is their current position in the NCGA?
      1. Senator 
      2. House Representative
    2. What committees do they sit on?
    3. Have they been supportive of public schools in the past? 
    4. Have they supported local programs or events for public schools?
    5. Do they have any personal connections to public schools? 
    6. Have they been in leadership positions related to public schools such as school board members or PTA members?
  2. Make the appointment
    1. Start scheduling your visit immediately. It may take a while. 
    2. Make it clear that the group will be constituents and you want to meet with the NCGA member. If the member isn’t available, ask to speak to the legislative assistant, not interns. 
    3. Decide if you want the meeting to be in person or virtual. 
    4. Oftentimes scheduling a visit is hard. Offices can be unresponsive. Continue to call, email and in some cases, go to their office and schedule an appointment in person. Be persistent!
    5. Call and confirm the appointment a few days before the meeting.
  4. Recruit constituents for the meeting
    1. Recruit constituents to go to the visit from your contacts in the community.  Call through petitions, sign up sheets from meetings, ally organizations, etc.
    2. Before making calls, be prepared with talking points and/or a phone script with all the details. 
    3. Who are you meeting with? Why is it important?  
    4. Attendees to the advocacy visit must be available to come to both the actual advocacy visit and a planning meeting beforehand so that everyone is up to date on the issue, our request, and their role.
  5. Hold a planning meeting 
    1. Schedule a convenient time and place for the planning meeting.
    2. Have everyone introduce themselves.
    3. Discuss the issue at hand and your goals for the visit.
    4. Review who the NCGA member is, and any meaningful history.
    5. Review or create the agenda for the advocacy visit.
    6. Include demands: 
      1. Publicly oppose continuing to fund unaccountable vouchers. 
      2. Refuse to vote on any budget that does not include accountability for schools that accept voucher funds.
    7. Review techniques elected officials use to derail a meeting and create a plan with the facilitator to address them if they are used.
      1. Red Herring— Brings up issues to sidetrack you
      2. Passing the buck—To another level of government
      3. The Chatterbox—Doesn’t allow you to get in a word
      4. The White Rabbit— “I’m running late…”
      5. The Friendly Put-Off— Don’t get fooled by the friendly tone
      6. Trust Me — Never “trust me.” Get specific commitments, not assurances of friendship.
    8. Decide who will take what part on the agenda
    9. Plan meeting logistics 
  6. During the Visit
    1. Follow the agenda
    2. Remember to be aware of techniques that the legislator may use to avoid demands 
    3. Make sure the facilitators keep control of the meeting 
      1. Ensure everyone has time to speak, but doesn’t go over 
      2. Make sure you’ve made your ask
      3. Make sure the NCGA member doesn’t derail the meeting
    4. Make your asks and record responses
    5. Have a member of the group take notes of the entire meeting, putting special emphasis on any follow up needed.
  7.  Follow Up 
    1. Discuss the visit with the team; did you all hear the same thing?
      1. What did the member or staffer commit to? 
      2. Was the tone supportive (is this a champion) or someone we’ll have to sway? 
      3. Are there any pending commitments or actions we need to take action on? 
    2. Divide follow up tasks among willing participants
      1. Who will make sure a Thank You letter is sent that reminds them about what he/she committed to and what we ask of them?
      2. Was there any information the member/staffer requested that should be sent? 
      3. Will the notetaker type up notes and share with your base? 
      4. Turn what you learned into a strategy
    3. What’s the next pressure point on the member so you can continue to advocate for your schools?
    4. Tell us about it! Email us at [email protected]  and share how it went.
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