“It boils down to choice.”

“That is the essence of what our entire country is founded upon, not having some centrally-planned system forcing us into a cookie-cutter, approved solution. In most other areas of our life that's true, but you don’t get to choose in education unless you have the means to pay for it or have the time for homeschooling. Education is an exception to our way of life.”

“We chose a very-academically-challenging classical school for our four kids and it’s important because of where their gifts lie. I’m fairly certain none of them are going to be college athletes, but their academic and musical gifts fit in well with the classical Christian education system. But I don't think that's for everybody – every family should be able to make that choice for themselves and their own family. It's just that ability to customize and choose what is right for your own family.”

“Because of the choice we made, people think that we must be fabulously wealthy – if we had any chance at that, having four kids in private school certainly ruins it, because that is where our money goes. And tuition is still significantly less than what the state pays for the public school system. When you factor in federal and local funding, the per-pupil spending in Idaho is almost double what I'm paying at the elementary grades.”

“If every family had access to those resources, they could all choose for themselves. We get it through sacrifice, but the money belongs to them, not the state – they should have the right to take their money and use it as they see fit. There's nothing more American than that.”

Ryan Spoon

Boise, Idaho