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"School choice" as conservatives tend to use the phrase can be implemented several ways. The voucher is only one. Charles Murray suggested that a tuition tax credit would be preferable, both to avert the spectre of government control of private schools and to insure against kickback schemes. Of course, tax credits don't reach under-earners nearly as well as a voucher system, which is a big political demerit.

No, the food stamp didn't result in government regulation of supermarkets... but have we forgotten that government aid to colleges, and to college students in the form of loans and grants, has been used to justify thoroughgoing regulation of colleges, in particular as regards admissions policies and student racial classifications?

There is danger here. Watch the educrats' unions. If they ever cease to oppose school choice directly, their next move will strike at the choice program's point of greatest vulnerability: the place where there's leverage by which to re-establish educrat control. That's how we'll know where the political weak point is.

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
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tuition tax credit

As you know, the IRS code and the states' depts of revenue number thousands and thousands of pages of regulations describing, among other things, who and which programs are eligible for what in tax credit programs.

Laws are generally written without specific regulations spelled out. Regs are an easy point of control for all Depts of Education with the stated goal being "accountability."

but have we forgotten that government aid to colleges, and to college students in the form of loans and grants, has been used to justify thoroughgoing regulation of colleges, in particular as regards admissions policies and student racial classifications?

I think the distinction is this: First, no one is required to go to college by the government, unlike schools. Citizens are not directly taxed for college scholarships and grants. Secondly, the money for such programs as college grants comes from "general tax revenue", unlike your local public school district who taxes you directly.