{"id":180915,"date":"2026-02-26T08:05:21","date_gmt":"2026-02-26T08:05:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/180915\/"},"modified":"2026-02-26T08:05:21","modified_gmt":"2026-02-26T08:05:21","slug":"february-27-2026-the-austin-chronicle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/180915\/","title":{"rendered":"February 27, 2026 \u2022 The Austin Chronicle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Exclusive Education<\/p>\n<p>Dear Editor,<\/p>\n<p>Hats off to Sammie Seamon\u2019s in-depth article on the many problems associated with Texas\u2019\u00a0new\u00a0voucher program, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.austinchronicle.com\/news\/the-new-voucher-era\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">The\u00a0New\u00a0Voucher Era<\/a>\u201d [News, Feb. 13].<\/p>\n<p>I learned a lot\u00a0from\u00a0the article, and appreciate the in-depth research, and even the nuance, including for example perspective\u00a0from\u00a0parents like me \u2013 who are supportive of public education, yet still evaluating what options the vouchers could open up.<\/p>\n<p>One major oversight: Even though the article contained a whole section focused on religious and parochial schools, it failed to mention that Gov. Abbott, A.G. Paxton, and Comptroller Hancock have restricted any voucher funds\u00a0from\u00a0going to Islamic schools. This is clearly discriminatory, and there\u2019s an expectation that they\u2019ll get sued and then compelled to provide funding because the outright bigotry driving their decision violates the law.<\/p>\n<p>This part of the story has large local implications, as there are an estimated 60,000 Muslims in the Austin area, and at least eight Islamic schools in the city and surrounding area. It\u2019s an important and developing part of the voucher story, so I was surprised it wasn\u2019t included in the otherwise well-written and researched piece.<\/p>\n<p>It is my hope the Chronicle will include coverage of the voucher issue in future issues, and that it incorporates the developments on the state\u2019s attempted Muslim ban for voucher funds.<\/p>\n<p>Ali Sohail Ishaq<\/p>\n<p class=\"collection-link has-small-font-size\">This article appears in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.austinchronicle.com\/issues\/february-27-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">February 27 \u2022 2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-small-font-size\">A note to readers:\u00a0Bold and uncensored,\u00a0The Austin Chronicle\u00a0has been Austin\u2019s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community\u2019s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Exclusive Education Dear Editor, Hats off to Sammie Seamon\u2019s in-depth article on the many problems associated with Texas\u2019\u00a0new\u00a0voucher&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":106155,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":{"0":"post-180915","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-austin","8":"tag-austin","9":"tag-austin-headlines","10":"tag-austin-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180915","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180915"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180915\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180915"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180915"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180915"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}