Wyoming's school voucher program could allow as much as $50 million a year of state money to be spent on private schools.
A new lawsuit from teachers and parents across the state alleges the program is unconstitutional and will result in taxpayer dollars funding schools that discriminate against children based on ability and identity.
Wyoming lawmakers approved the voucher program during the 2024 legislative session. They expanded the program, renaming it the Steamboat Legacy Scholarship, during the 2025 session.
The expanded program gives eligible individual families up to $7,000 a year for tuition at charter or other private schools or other private or homeschooling costs. The first payments are planned to go out in time for the fall 2025 semester.
The lawsuit was filed in Laramie County District Court by the Wyoming Education Association and several parents of children across the state.
Many of the plaintiff parents have children with disabilities, or transgender or nonbinary children. They argue state funds will now go to schools that can discriminate against their children.
"All the individual plaintiffs believe that public funds should be used to support public schools that their child and all other Wyoming children can attend," the suit states. "[They] object to the use of taxpayer public money at exclusive private voucher schools that may refuse to admit their children and that lack the same accountability, uniformity, and curriculum standards required at public schools."
Kim Amen is the president of the Wyoming Education Association.
"Our public schools take every student," she said. "They're for every student in Wyoming, regardless of where they live, regardless of their special needs, regardless of their gender identity. What private schools don't have to do is take every single student."
Amen said the voucher program also lacks meaningful oversight and it will divert taxpayer money away from public schools at a time when they need more support than ever.
"We believe that public schools are the center of our communities and the heart of Wyoming, and that we should be investing in them and not diverting money away from them," she said.
The association recently won a separate lawsuit against the state, which ruled Wyoming has been unconstitutionally underfunding its public schools.
"They don't seem to have the money to fund the schools that are already in existence," Amen said. "But passing this voucher program then allows them to take money out of the state coffers and give it to private entities when that money could be used for public good."
The association alleges the state is failing in its constitutional duty to provide a "complete and uniform system of public instruction" by funding, through the voucher program, education that is outside of its control.
Because the vouchers are available to all families regardless of income, the association further alleges the state is violating the state constitution's general prohibition on donating public funds to private entities, which only allows such transfers to support "the poor."
"This money takes public dollars and subsidizes private schooling," Amen said. "It benefits wealthy families more because they already have their students in private schools, and so this is a subsidy to help them pay for that private schooling at the cost of diverting money from public education. We believe very strongly that this voucher program is unconstitutional."
State lawmakers are currently reworking the state's funding model.
The Wyoming Department of Education will oppose the education association's lawsuit.
"The timing of this legal filing displays wanton disregard for the nearly 4,000 Wyoming families that have signed up for the program and the many service providers that are counting on those families," Superintendent Megan Degenfelder wrote in a news release. "It is reckless and Wyoming children are the collateral damage."
She continues:
"To our applicant families and the education service providers and schools that have worked hard to be prepared to support these families, know that I am continuing to prepare to distribute funds as planned. I will be working with the Attorney General's office to fight for your right to choose the best educational path for your children, and will update you as we know more."
A hearing for WEA v. Wyoming is scheduled for Friday in Laramie County District Court.
The education association is asking the court to stop the voucher program from going into effect before it can distribute its first payments to private school families.
