A recent guest opinion piece in the Deseret News argued that the school voucher issue in Utah is “percolating at a low boil” and “will be a hot political topic for the next few years.” While it’s true that legislative and legal battles over education choice are ongoing, it’s clear that the more crucial war has been won: Parents want education choice.
Utah leaders should embrace this reality, not only by preserving and expanding education choice, but by making every option easier for families to understand. In an era of ever more educational opportunities, accurate information is becoming just as important as access.
For starters, according to 2026 polling data, 60% of Utah voters have a favorable opinion of the Utah Fits All Scholarship — Utah’s education savings account — and 56% of K-12 parents are interested in enrolling a child in the program. More broadly, the poll also shows that 76% support parents choosing the best school for their child.
These polling results in Utah are noteworthy, given that in 2007 voters rejected a voucher program in a statewide referendum. Since then, it’s been noted that the COVID-19 pandemic caused a genuine shift in parents’ mindsets and real-world choices, with more Utahns choosing public charter schools and nonpublic options like homeschooling and private schools.
A poll from Sutherland Institute in 2025 shows overwhelming support (78%) among Utah voters for increased transparency in open enrollment, a common form of public-school choice that allows students to transfer between public district schools, presumably because parents are eager to understand their public options as well. Large margins of Utah voters in the poll supported reforms in open enrollment, regardless of age or political affiliation.
And already, the majority of states have opted into the new federal scholarship tax credit program, including states with Republican and Democratic governors, with many more states considering whether to participate.
This new federal tax credit program lets parents access scholarships for multiple educational uses in participating states even if they don’t have a state-backed program like an education savings account, voucher or state tax credit scholarship.
Whetting the appetite of parents in states that lack education choice programs will likely only increase support of education choice, not diminish it.
The burgeoning education choice movement has created new programs, yes, but it’s also made parents more eager to understand their options, ask questions, learn about their rights and fulfill their responsibilities.
In 2025, 60% of U.S. parents of school-aged children said they considered sending at least one of their children to a different school than the previous year; by the following year, 75% had considered, searched for or enrolled at least one of their children in a new or different school.
To meet this need, Sutherland Institute just launched the Utah Schools Navigator, a Utah-focused online search tool for parents looking to explore the education options near them.
It’s one of many such tools popping up across the country as families seek to navigate the evolving education landscape, search for schools and understand state programs. The growth of similar tools and websites reflects that the new landscape of choices — public, private and beyond — is here to stay.
Utah leaders can help Utah parents understand their options by increasing the transparency and user friendliness of public education information, such as open enrollment capacity or curriculum used.
While there is real pushback against education choice, including state constitutional challenges to school choice legislation across the country, the new education landscape — including parent demand — is not going away.
Some education choice programs have recently survived state-level legal challenges (like Idaho and West Virginia), while others remain tied up in court (like Utah). But even when court rulings are unfavorable to education choice programs, those programs may adapt rather than disappear. A court ruling has impact, but it cannot undo parents’ growing expectation that they should be informed consumers of choices in their children’s education.
We should welcome this new education era by helping parents understand their options — public and private — so they can make the best decisions for their students.