podcastED: SUFS president Doug Tuthill interviews Nevada State Sen. Heidi Gansert

On this episode, Tuthill talks to the senator from Nevada’s 15th District about the education choice landscape in the Silver State.

Efforts to fund an education savings account program in Nevada, which were derailed by a legal challenge after the program was created in 2015, were unsuccessful in 2017 after Republicans lost a majority in both houses in 2016. But the state’s one private school choice program, a tax credit scholarship, was expanded during the recent legislative session to serve up to 2,500 students.

Tuthill and Gansert discuss the scholarship’s path as well as the state’s rapidly growing charter school networks.

“If you’re trying to break the cycle of generational poverty, education is the key … You’ve got to keep fighting for students and consider what’s in the best interest of students, not interest groups. (Education choice) makes a lot of sense.”

EPISODE DETAILS:

  • Nevada’s education choice landscape
  • Nevada’s failed education savings account which had the potential for the broadest eligibility in the country
  • Negotiations during Nevada’s most recent legislative session that expanded the state’s tax credit scholarship
  • The growth of Nevada’s charter schools
  • Advice to lawmakers in states where support for education choice is not universal

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BY reimaginED staff