Florida lawmakers are taking steps to make it easier for parents to enroll in the state’s voucher program for children with special needs.
Rep. Rene Plasencia, R-Orlando, spoke passionately about the proposal before the House K-12 Innovation Subcommittee gave it a green-light Tuesday.
Right now, the law requires children to enroll in public schools for at least a year before they can receive a McKay Scholarship. Plasencia is the sponsor of HB 829, which would cut that waiting period down to one semester.
He said the public-school attendance requirement has kept some students with the most complex disabilities from getting scholarships. His wife works with some of those students. Advocates have pushed for years to go further than Plasencia’s bill, and eliminate the public-school attendance requirement entirely.
“It doesn’t necessarily solve all the issues we have, but it is a step in the right direction,” he said.
Vicki Jenkins, the exceptional education director for the Martin County school district, spoke against the proposal. She said the current law allows parents to try public schools for their children before choosing a private option.
“How do you know, if you have not been presented with what the public school can offer, whether or not you’re making the right choice?” she asked.
That sentiment didn’t sit well with Rep. Ross Spano, R-Dover.
“I get uncomfortable when what I hear is, the school has a better ability to make a decision about what’s best for their child than the parent does,” he said.
Jenkins said she herself is the parent of a child with special needs. And she said she has, at times, needed the guidance of professionals to make decisions for her own child. She also said making it easier for parents to choose private schools would undermine the public school system, since public money would follow students to the schools their parents chose.
“The parent has the ultimate choice,” she said, but at the same time, “I’m not in favor of moving all that funding so easily.”
The bill ultimately passed unanimously, though, after members coalesced around the idea that giving parents fewer hoops to jump through before choosing another educational setting did not undermine public schools. Plasencia, aka “Coach P,” has been a public-school teacher for most of his career.
“I’ve been in public education from the age of three to the age of 41. That’s where my passion lies,” he said. “We’re breaking down these barriers so that we can provide for our most vulnerable.”
