There are three certainties in life: death, taxes, and scaremongering that school choice will destroy public education.

Whenever a state legislature considers a measure to create a new education choice policy, the proverbial Chicken Littles inevitably start squawking that the sky is falling.

Take Texas’s proposed K–12 education savings account (ESA) policy. Texas legislators are considering a bill to create ESAs, which would allow families to use their child’s portion of state funding on a wide variety of educational products and services. ESA policies empower families to choose the learning environments that align with their values and work best for their children.

Predictably, opponents of education freedom are predicting utter ruin.

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Texas state Sen. Roland Gutierrez, a Democrat, screeched that the education choice proposal would “destroy our public school system,” presumably because he believes families would leave them if they could. (He sends his own children to private school.) Houston Education Association President Michelle Williams wailed that ESAs would “decimate public schools.” Kardal Coleman, Chairman of the Dallas County Democratic Party, shrieked that the ESA proposal is “a direct assault on our public schools and a grave threat to the future of our children.”

The Chicken Littles should take a breath. The sky isn’t falling.

There are now 33 states with a school choice policy, including 11 that make every K–12 student eligible, yet there is no evidence that school choice harms public schools, let alone “destroys” them. In fact, the best available evidence shows that—like in nearly every other area of life—more choices and healthy competition lead to better outcomes.

Researchers at the University of Arkansas found a “strong and statistically significant association” between education freedom (including the robustness of a state’s school choice policies) and “both academic scores and academic gains.” Indeed, 26 out of 29 empirical studies found that education choice policies have a statistically significant positive effect on the academic performance of students who remain at their traditional public schools. One found no visible effect, and only two found a small negative effect.

But evidence doesn’t matter to the Chicken Littles. Nor do they have any sense of proportionality. As we detailed in a new EdChoice report, there is no correlation between the size and scope of school choice proposals in states nationwide and the rhetorical intensity of school choice opponents.

In other words, opponents of education freedom tend to throw everything they have against such proposals, regardless of their size and scope. Whether the proposal would offer school choice to all students or to very few students, opponents of school choice insist that it will harm public schools. Some will even claim that it will destroy public schools, regardless of the evidence to the contrary.

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Fortunately, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott knows better. “Government-mandated schools cannot meet the unique needs of every student,” he observed during his recent State of the State Address. “But Texas can provide families with choices to meet those needs.”

Noting that Texas already has a pilot ESA program that has expanded educational opportunities for students with special needs, Abbott declared: “It’s time to expand that same opportunity to every Texas family.”

The Texas Legislature should follow Gov. Abbott’s lead. Policymakers should resist calls to scale back the ESA proposal. There is no reason to expect that reducing the size and scope of the ESA will reduce the intensity of opposition.

Instead, they should stay the course, be bold, and ensure that every Texas child gets access to the quality education he or she deserves.