Cost of Choice

The largest participant in the Louisiana Scholarship Program, the New Orleans Archdiocese with 3,700 scholarship students, has more than half of the total students in the program.

The Louisiana Scholarship Program allows schools to simply notify the state to participate in the program rather than a lengthy application process like public and charter schools face for approval.

Public money has flowed into one New Orleans voucher school despite low student scores, allegations of cheating and nepotism concerns.

Many parents said they are unaware of how their child's school performs in the Louisiana Scholarship Program. As a part of the joint investigation, The Cost of Choice, a searchable database is created containing all of the state's data on scholarship schools.

A joint investigation found many students in the Louisiana Scholarship Program are going to lower performing schools, the opposite of what was touted during the program's launch in 2012.