By Trish Wikger
Guest column
(The Gazette granted permission to publish this guest column that it published April 10, 2025.)
State Auditor Rob Sand has been issuing a steady drip of inaccurate and unfounded comments regarding Iowa’s private school community and the Students First Education Savings Account program. It’s time to call out his fearmongering and untruths. We represent the thousands of Iowans — including parents, educators, and community members — who value parental choice in education, support non-public schools, and are fed up with these unwarranted, baseless attacks.
Private schools have successfully educated students for nearly 200 years in Iowa, doing so with a fraction of the funding available to public schools. Private schools are important community partners and nonprofit employers in cities and towns large and small. We are proud of Iowa’s private schools and the students they have served. It is alarming that our State Auditor would disrespect our private school leaders, teachers and parents.
We would like to take this opportunity to respectfully bring the focus back to the foundational principles of the Educational Savings Account (ESA) program. ESA funds belong to parents, not schools. Every family receiving an ESA must use the funds for educational purposes — tuition, textbooks, tutoring, and other approved educational expenses. These aren’t blank checks handed to private schools; they’re limited-use funds directed by parents under state guidelines. In fact, Iowa’s ESA program contracts with a third-party vendor to process claims, and expenditures are subject to state review to ensure funds are used appropriately. That’s a level of accountability most government programs don’t even match.
Schools receiving parent-approved ESA funds must be accredited by the State of Iowa or a third-party accreditation agency approved by the state. That is serious accountability. Private schools have another level of accountability — parents. When families choose a private school, they are actively holding those schools accountable with their feet and their wallets. If a school mismanages resources, underperforms, or loses the trust of its families, enrollment drops — and so does funding. That kind of direct, personal accountability is often far more powerful than government oversight.
Sand fails to question the dozens of Iowa programs that distribute taxpayer money to individuals and private entities, programs that give the State Auditor no control or audit authority over how those funds are spent. And yet, we don’t hear him railing against those programs. When a family shops for groceries with SNAP funds the government doesn’t audit the store. If he doesn’t question other peoples’ choices on how to use government funds, why does he question a parent’s choice to use ESA funds to send their children to an accredited, private school?
ESAs are designed to give families more control over their children’s education — especially those who can’t otherwise afford private school tuition — and it’s working exactly as predicted and intended. Enrollment in non-public schools is rising. ESAs empower parents and ensure funding follows students, not systems. If we truly care about fairness and educational opportunity for all Iowans, then we should stop treating parents’ choices as threats and start treating parents as partners. Let’s work together and support all educational choices parents make — both private and public. Only then can we be sure that all Iowa children are educated in the setting that best meets their needs.
(Trish Wilger is executive director of the Iowa Alliance for Choice in Education and Iowa Advocates for Choice in Education. She is also writing on behalf of Parents for Educational Choice members and Iowa Council for American Private Education members:
Dale Akkerman, Wellsburg; Donna Bishop, Des Moines; Josh Bowar, Sioux Center; Tom Chapman, Urbandale; Lynne Devaney, Davenport; Jan Doellinger, Cedar Rapids; Linda Duffy, Davenport; Rob Edel, Davenport; Joel Groenenboom, Oskaloosa; Steve Kane, Marion; Patty Lansink, Ida Grove; Renae Lesan, Ames; Bill Meyer, Davenport; Paul Miguez, Ankeny; Lydia Quick, Ankeny; Jeff Rains, Des Moines; Nick Ryan, Waukee; Sue Smith, Des Moines; Rob Szalay, Urbandale; Tim Van Soelen, Sioux Center; Cathy Walz, Marion; Trish Wilger, Bettendorf; Dan Zylstra, Pella.)
