NAACP Illinois State Conference Urges State Leaders to Reject Federal Private-School Voucher Scheme (Kankakee, IL) — The NAACP Illinois State Conference of Branches announced its opposition to Illinois participating in the federal Education Freedom Tax Credit, calling on state officials to reject the private-school voucher program and focus resources on strengthening public schools.
The federal initiative, announced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and Internal Revenue Service, is scheduled to launch on Jan. 1, 2027. It provides a federal tax credit for contributions made to scholarship-granting organizations that support K-12 private-school tuition. State participation is voluntary, but states that choose to participate must officially identify qualifying scholarship organizations for the federal government.
The Illinois conference joined a national civil rights coalition—which includes the Legal Defense Fund, the national NAACP, Advancement Project, EdTrust, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, and UnidosUS—in urging governors across the country to opt out. The coalition raised concerns over the negative impacts private-school vouchers have on public school funding, civil rights protections, and racial and socioeconomic equity.
“The NAACP Illinois State Conference believes that every child deserves access to a high-quality public education, regardless of race, income, disability, geography, or family circumstance,” said Theodis Pace, President of the NAACP Illinois State Conference of Branches. “Illinois should be strengthening the public schools that serve all of our children, not creating policies that could divert resources and opportunity away from the public education system”.
Legislation to align Illinois with the federal program has already been introduced in the state legislature. Senate Bill 3850, titled the Educational Choice for Children Act, would establish a framework for the Governor to submit a list of approved scholarship-granting organizations to the U.S. Treasury. The bill was referred to the Senate Assignments Committee and remains pending in the 104th General Assembly.
The NAACP Illinois State Conference highlighted four core areas of concern regarding the tax credit program:
- Protecting Public Education: Public schools educate the vast majority of Illinois students and maintain direct accountability to local communities.
- Educational Equity: State policy must address persistent disparities affecting Black and Brown students, students with disabilities, low-income families, and historically underserved communities.
- Civil-Rights Protections: State leaders must closely examine non-discrimination, accessibility, transparency, and accountability standards for private institutions benefiting from the program.
- Investment in Public Schools: Illinois should prioritize adequate funding for educators, classrooms, special education, early childhood programs, school facilities, and initiatives designed to close achievement and opportunity gaps.
While acknowledging that families have diverse educational needs, the organization emphasized that educational opportunity and civil rights protections must not depend on a family’s income, race, ZIP code, or ability to navigate a private school marketplace.
“Our goal should be to strengthen every public school and ensure that every child has a genuine opportunity to learn, grow, and succeed,” Pace said. “We cannot achieve educational equity by abandoning the public institutions responsible for educating all of our children”.
The State Conference called directly on Gov. JB Pritzker, the Illinois General Assembly, and state education policymakers to formally reject participation in the federal program and prioritize sustained investment in Illinois’ public education system, noting that public education remains essential to a healthy democracy.
NAACP Illinois State Conference Urges State Leaders to Reject Federal Private-School Voucher Scheme
