Editor’s note: This report from Jonathan Butcher, Will Skillman Fellow in Education, Center for Education Policy at The Heritage Foundation, and Jason Bedrick, Research Fellow, Center for Education Policy at The Heritage Foundation, concludes that education savings accounts empower parents with the ability to meet every child’s unique education needs and should be available to all school-aged children. It includes a review of changes to education savings account plans around the country, specifically in Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

In July 2022, Arizona lawmakers converted the nation’s oldest K–12 education savings account (ESA) policy into the country’s most inclusive learning option: Every child in Arizona can now apply for a private account that empowers families to customize a student’s learning experience according to his or her unique needs.

^{News Release, “Governor Ducey Signs Most Expansive School Choice Legislation in Recent Memory,” Office of Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, July 7, 2022, https://azgovernor.gov/governor/news/2022/07/governor-ducey-signs-most-expansive-school-choice-legislation-recent-memory (accessed October 12, 2022).}

With an ESA, the state deposits a portion of a child’s education spending from the state K–12 formula—the formula used to determine per-student spending in traditional schools—into a private account that parents use to buy education products and services for their children. The accounts are worth approximately $7,000 for mainstream children, with larger amounts awarded to children with special needs.

Families can use an ESA to hire a personal tutor for their child, find an education therapist, pay private school tuition, buy curricula and textbooks, save money from year to year for future expenses, and more. The accounts allow families to choose more than one education product or service; moreover, they provide the versatility parents needed to continue their children’s education during the pandemic when schools were closed to in-person learning.

^{Jonathan Butcher, “COVID-19 Has Accentuated Value of Education Savings Accounts,” reimaginED, May 12, 2020, https://nextstepsblog.org​/2020/05/covid-19-has-accentuated-value-of-education-savings-accounts/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Arizona lawmakers adopted the nation’s first ESAs for children with special needs in 2011, and nine other states (Florida, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia) subsequently created similar ESA opportunities for eligible students. Each state offers accounts to children who meet different criteria.

After the pandemic, as researchers report steep learning losses across grade levels and subjects, the call for quality learning options is especially urgent. Arizona’s new law is remarkable because all K–12 children can participate.

In Florida and Tennessee, for example, children with certain special needs are eligible, while Mississippi and North Carolina’s accounts operate under strict caps on the number of participating students due to either provisions in state law or annual appropriations. In West Virginia, all children attending public schools or entering kindergarten are eligible, making it the second-most inclusive ESA policy behind Arizona’s.

Research conducted by The Heritage Foundation in 2017 helps to explain the eligibility criteria and other account details for the savings accounts in Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Tennessee, but much has changed in the past five years. 

^{Jonathan Butcher, “A Primer on Education Savings Accounts,” Heritage Foundation Backgrounder No. 3245, September 15, 2017, https://www.heritage​.org/sites/default/files/2017-09/BG3245.pdf.}

The 2017 report also distinguished between the accounts, which allow families to purchase more than one education product or service at the same time, and school vouchers, which parents can only use to pay private school tuition for their children. The accounts also differ from tax-credit scholarship policies, which provide tax credits to individuals or corporations that make charitable donations to nonprofit organizations that in turn award private school scholarships to eligible students.

^{Jason Bedrick, “Earning Full Credit: A Toolkit for Designing Tax-Credit Scholarship Policies (2022 Edition),” Pioneer Institute, March 30, 2022, https://​pioneerinstitute.org/pioneer-research/earning-full-credit-a-toolkit-for-designing-tax-credit-scholarship-policies-2022-edition/ (accessed October 31, 2022).}

In this Backgrounder, we will review the changes to education savings account plans around the country, offer an analysis of the new states with ESA laws, and provide policy recommendations for the future of ESAs.

What’s changed?

Nearly all education savings account plans created since Arizona introduced the concept in 2011 have changed eligibility, funding mechanisms, or other significant provisions:

Arizona. Arizona’s accounts were initially only available to children with special needs but expanded to include children assigned to failing schools and children adopted from the state foster care system in 2012.

^{Butcher, “A Primer on Education Savings Accounts.”}

Lawmakers later expanded student eligibility to include children from active-duty military families and children living on tribal lands, among others. In 2022, Arizona opened eligibility to every K–12 student in the state, some 1.1 million school children.

 ^{News release, “Governor Ducey Signs Most Expansive School Choice Legislation in Recent Memory.”}

When Governor Doug Ducey (R) signed the expansion, 11,775 Arizona students were using the accounts, and after the application period opened in September 2022, the state department of education received about 22,500 new applications from interested families within two months.

^{Jason Bedrick and Jonathan Butcher, “Arizona Shows the Nation What Education Freedom Looks Like,” Newsweek, September 14, 2022, https://​www.newsweek.com/arizona-shows-nation-what-education-freedom-looks-like-opinion-1742145 (accessed October 12, 2022); EdChoice, “Arizona: Empowerment Scholarship Accounts,” https://www.edchoice.org/school-choice/programs/arizona-empowerment-scholarship-accounts/ (accessed October 31, 2022); and Christine Accurso, “Arizona’s New ESA School Choice Law Is a Win for Everyone,” The Washington Examiner, September 9, 2022, https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/community-family/arizonas-new-esa-school-choice-law-is-a-win-for-everyone (accessed October 12, 2022); Eryka Forquer, “Applications for school vouchers at nearly 22,500 so far, Education Department says,” Arizona Republic, October 7, 2022, https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-education/2022/10/07/arizona-school-vouchers-nearly-22-500-applications​-pour-so-far/8208504001/ (accessed November 3, 2022).}

Florida. In 2014, Florida lawmakers enacted the nation’s second education savings accounts, called Gardiner Scholarships. In 2021, state officials adopted a proposal to combine the program with the state’s K–12 private school scholarship program, called Family Empowerment Scholarships, creating the Family Empowerment Scholarships for Students with Unique Abilities (FES-UA).

^{Step Up for Students, “Basic Program Facts about the Family Empowerment Scholarship (formerly the Gardiner Scholarship),” https://www​.stepupforstudents.org/research-and-reports/gardiner-scholarship/basic-program-facts-gardiner/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

In the 2021–2022 school year, 21,155 children were using accounts.

 ^{Step Up for Students, “Family Empowerment Scholarship for Children with Unique Abilities,” August 2022, https://www.stepupforstudents.org/wp​-content/uploads/2022.8.10-FES-UA-ESA.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022).}

North Carolina. North Carolina lawmakers enacted Personal Education Savings Accounts in 2017, but in the 2022–2023 school year, these accounts will merge with the state’s K–12 private school scholarships for children with special needs (Disability Grants).

 ^{North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority, “Education Student Accounts (ESA+) Program,” https://www.ncseaa.edu/k12/esa/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Account holders will still be able to purchase more than one education product or service, a feature of the accounts in every state with such a program. Some students with special needs may be eligible for accounts worth up to $17,000 (an increase from the original account award of $9,000).

Account holders can also participate in the Disability Grant program and the state’s Opportunity Scholarships, which are K–12 private school scholarships for children from low-income families. As of March 2022, 658 students were using an account.

^{North Carolina Education Assistance Authority, “Education Savings Account Summary of Data,” March 16, 2022, https://www.ncseaa.edu/education​-savings-account-summary-of-data/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Tennessee. Tennessee lawmakers allowed children with certain special needs to access accounts in 2015. (The program officially launched in 2017.)

^{Tennessee General Assembly, 2015 Session, S.B. 27, https://wapp.capitol.tn.gov/apps/BillInfo/Default.aspx?BillNumber=SB0027 (accessed October 31, 2022).}

In the 2020–2021 school year, 307 students were using the accounts.

^{EdChoice, “Tennessee: Individualized Education Account Program,” https://www.edchoice.org/school-choice/programs/tennessee-individualized​-education-account-program/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

In 2019, lawmakers adopted another ESA proposal, with these accounts available to children in Nashville and Memphis (Shelby County). School district officials sued to force children to remain in assigned schools, but in June 2022, the state supreme court ruled that the program could begin operation in the coming school year. In August, the Chancery Court for Davidson County rejected more motions that would have stalled the program.

 ^{Conor Beck, “Court Victory for Parents Defending Tennessee’s Educational Savings Account Program,” Institute for Justice, August 5, 2022, https://ij​.org/press-release/court-victory-for-parents-defending-tennessees-educational-savings-account-program/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

New state laws

In 2021, lawmakers in five states adopted new education savings account plans, including two that combined tax-credit scholarships with education savings accounts:

West Virginia. West Virginia lawmakers adopted a proposal that made nearly every child in the state eligible to apply for an account, making it the most expansive account any state officials had approved at that time, and the second-most expansive after Arizona’s universal expansion in 2022.

 ^{West Virginia Legislature, 2021 Regular Session, HB 2013, https://www.wvlegislature.gov/Bill_Status/bills_history.cfm?INPUT=2013&year=2021&​sessiontype=RS (accessed October 31, 2022).}

All students attending a public school in West Virginia for at least 45 days or who are entering kindergarten are eligible to apply for the accounts, aptly named Hope Scholarships.

 ^{Lawmakers require students to attend a public school for 45 days because by that time in the school year the student is included in the traditional school funding formula for that year. Then, if the student uses an education savings account, the taxpayer money from the public school formula “follows” the child to an education savings account and no new taxpayer money is needed. If a child was in a private school or homeschooled, new taxpayer money would need to be added to the state treasury to fund that child’s account. If students are required to attend a public school before using an account, the education savings account program will not generate a fiscal note stating that new taxpayer money is required for students to use the accounts.}

Similar to the accounts in Arizona, state officials deposit a child’s portion of the state school spending formula into a private account that parents can use to buy multiple products and services.

Each account will be worth approximately $4,300, according to the Cardinal Institute, a research institute in West Virginia.

 ^{Cardinal Institute, “Questions from Parents,” https://www.cardinalinstitute.com/questions-from-parents/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Parents can use the accounts for personal tutors and education therapies, along with private school tuition and private online learning programs.

Implementation of the ESA policy was delayed because education industry special interest groups supported a lawsuit to force account holders back into assigned public schools. The state supreme court of appeals agreed to consider the case, and on October 6, 2022, the court upheld the program, removing an injunction that had prevented families from using the accounts.

 ^{Brad McElhinny, “Supreme Court Takes Over Hope Scholarship Appeal, Promises Hearing Soon, Says No to Stay,” MetroNews, August 18, 2022, https://​wvmetronews.com/2022/08/18/supreme-court-takes-over-hope-scholarship-appeal-promises-hearing-soon-says-no-to-stay/#:~:text=Hearing​%20a%20challenge%20to%20the,from%20the%20public%20education%20system (accessed October 12, 2022), and Amanda Kieffer, “Press Release: Cardinal Institute Celebrates Historic Win for West Virginia Families,” Cardinal Institute, October 6, 2022, https://www.cardinalinstitute.com/press​-release/wvscoa-upholds-hope-scholarship/ (accessed October 31, 2022).}

The program is now fully operational.

 ^{Conor Beck, “Victory for School Choice in West Virginia,” Institute for Justice, October 6, 2022, https://ij.org/press-release/victory-for-school-choice-in​-west-virginia/ (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Indiana. Indiana lawmakers adopted an account proposal that allows children with special needs from low- and middle-income families (i.e., household incomes of up to 300 percent of the income eligibility guidelines for the federal free- or reduced-priced lunch program).

 ^{Indiana General Assembly, 2021 Session, HB 1001, https://iga.in.gov/legislative/2021/bills/house/1001#document-dbc2cc8e (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Students do not have to attend a public school before applying for an account.

State officials limited funding for the accounts so that only 2,000 students can participate in 2022.

 ^{EdChoice, “Indiana: Education Scholarship Account Program,” https://www.edchoice.org/school-choice/programs/education-scholarship-account​-program/ (accessed October 31, 2022).}

New Hampshire. In New Hampshire, officials adopted Education Freedom Accounts in 2021. The accounts are available to students from households with incomes at or below 300 percent of the federal poverty line ($83,250 for a family of four in 2022–2023).

 ^{New Hampshire General Court, 2021 Session, HB 2, https://gencourt.state.nh.us/bill_status/legacy/bs2016/bill_status.aspx?lsr=1082&sy=2021&​sortoption=&txtsessionyear=2021&txtbillnumber=HB2 (accessed October 31, 2022).}

The accounts are administered by a K–12 private school scholarship organization, Children’s Scholarship Fund NH.

 ^{Education Freedom Coalition, Education Freedom NH, https://educationfreedomnh.org/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

In its first year of operation (the 2021–2022 school year), nearly 2,000 children used accounts. That amounts to more than 1 percent of K–12 students in the Granite State—a record enrollment, per capita, for the first year of operation of any education choice policy. Each account was worth approximately $3,400. As of September 2022, more than 3,025 students are receiving ESAs worth an average of $4,857.

 ^{Children’s Scholarship Fund New Hampshire, “Frequently Asked Questions,” https://1b2.ee8.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/NH​-FAQ-2.28.22.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022); Ethan Dewitt, “Education Freedom Accounts Double after One Year; Most Recipients outside Public School,” New Hampshire Bulletin, September 15, 2022, https://newhampshirebulletin.com/briefs/education-freedom-accounts-double-after-one-year​-most-recipients-outside-public-school/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Kentucky. Bluegrass State lawmakers created accounts funded by charitable donations to nonprofit, scholarship-granting organizations.

In Kentucky the new ESA Policy allows students to choose from a variety of education products and services in addition to private school tuition.

 ^{Kentucky Legislature, 2021 Session, HB 563, https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/record/21rs/hb563.html (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Eligible students include children in households with incomes of up to 175 percent of the income limit for the federal free- or reduced-priced lunch program.

The program has restrictive features not found in other states’ account offerings, though. One such feature prevents participants from receiving account funding if his or her household income increases to a figure greater than 250 percent of the income limit for free- or reduced-priced lunch.

^{EdChoice, “Kentucky: Education Opportunity Account Program,” https://www.edchoice.org/school-choice/programs/education-opportunity-account​-program/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Another provision states that only students living in large counties (with populations greater than 90,000) can use their accounts for private school tuition.

Lawmakers have not implemented Kentucky’s program yet due to a lawsuit challenging the accounts.

 ^{Kentucky Department of Revenue, “Education Opportunity Account Program,” October 12, 2021, https://revenue.ky.gov/News/Pages/Education​-Opportunity-Account-Program.aspx (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Missouri. Lawmakers in Missouri, as in Kentucky, adopted an education savings account program that is funded via charitable contributions to scholarship-granting organizations.

 ^{101st Missouri General Assembly, 1st Regular Session, HB 349, https://house.mo.gov/Bill.aspx?bill=HB349&year=2021&code=R (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Individuals will receive tax credits of up to 100 percent of their donations but the amount of credits claimed by any donor cannot exceed half of their annual state tax liability. Only 10 scholarship organizations are allowed to award accounts.

 ^{Cameron Gerber, “Parson Signs New ESA Program into Law,” The Missouri Times, September 7, 2022, https://themissouritimes.com/parson-signs-new​-esa-program-into-law/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Lawmakers limited the total amount of tax credits awarded to contributors to $25 million in the program’s first year.

Research

Since lawmakers’ adoption of the first account program in Arizona in 2011, research has demonstrated that account holders use their ESAs for more than private school tuition. The versatility of the accounts, which distinguishes them from K–12 private school vouchers, has allowed families to meet their children’s unique needs.

This distinction is important because in states with constitutional provisions that restrict the use of public spending on private learning options (known as “Blaine” amendments), parents’ ability to choose more than one learning option has allowed the accounts to survive judicial scrutiny in state courts that are hostile to traditional vouchers.

Parents’ ability to use ESAs for several education products and services at the same time is crucial for providing quality learning experiences outside the classroom.

In 2013 and 2016, researchers found that approximately one-third of Arizona account holders used their child’s ESA for more than one education product or service.

^{Lindsey M. Burke, “The Education Debit Card: What Arizona Parents Purchase with Education Savings Accounts,” EdChoice, August 2013, https://www​.edchoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/2013-8-Education-Debit-Card-WEB-NEW.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022), and Jonathan Butcher and Lindsey M. Burke, “The Education Debit Card II: What Arizona Parents Purchase with Education Savings Accounts,” EdChoice, February 2016, https://​www.edchoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/2016-2-The-Education-Debit-Card-II-WEB-1.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Again, parents’ access to textbooks, personal tutors, education therapists, online classes, and more is what makes the accounts unique among private learning options in states around the country.

In 2018, researchers found that more than one-third of account holders in Florida also used the ESAs for more than one purpose. This report also found that among these families purchasing more than one product or service, more than half (55 percent) paid for several products and services and did not purchase private school tuition—making them “customizers” of their children’s educations apart from private schools.

^{Lindsey Burke and Jason Bedrick, “Personalizing Education: How Florida Families Use Education Savings Accounts,” EdChoice, February 2018, https://​www.edchoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Personalizing-Education-By-Lindsey-Burke-and-Jason-Bedrick.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022).}

More recent studies continue to substantiate these findings that separate the accounts from traditional K–12 scholarships. In 2021, a study of North Carolina account holders found, for the first time, that a majority of account holders used their child’s ESA for more than one product or service. Sixty-four percent of account holders used their child’s ESA to select more than one education item or service.

^{Jonathan Butcher, “A Culture of Personalized Learning,” John Locke Foundation, August 13, 2021, https://www.johnlocke.org/research/a-culture-of​-personalized-learning/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

This figure is nearly double the share of families using the accounts in this way in the first two studies of ESA usage in Arizona.

This report also found that families using the accounts lived in ZIP codes where the average income was close to the statewide median. Fifty-three percent of account holders—more than half—live in areas in which the median income is within $10,000 of the statewide median. These findings mean that students from families of modest means are benefitting from the ESAs.

According to the report, families using private school scholarships at the same time as they participated in the state’s education savings account options in North Carolina also purchased more than one item or service. In North Carolina, families can access an education savings account and a K–12 private school scholarship option for children with special needs or from low-income families.

Even families that accessed an account and a scholarship used the new opportunities to pay for more than private school tuition, providing evidence that when the accounts are offered to families in addition to scholarships or vouchers, parents will still make education purchases according to a child’s needs.

A 2021 study analyzing Florida account holder spending found that parents continue to customize a child’s education when they remain with an ESA for longer periods. According to researchers Michelle L. Lofton and Marty Lueken, “The longer students remain in the program, the share of ESA funds devoted to private school tuition decreases while expenditure shares increase for curriculum, instruction, tutoring, and specialized services.”

^{Michelle L. Lofton and Martin F. Lueken, “Distribution of Education Savings Accounts Usage Among Families: Evidence from the Florida Gardner Program,” Brown University EdWorkingPaper No. 21-426, June 2021, https://www.edworkingpapers.com/sites/default/files/ai21-426.pdf (accessed October 12, 2022).}

The percent of Florida ESA funds that parents used each school year increased from 60 percent in 2015 to 73 percent in 2016 to 88 percent in 2019. During this same period, however, the amount of account funds spent on education products outside of tuition (“instructional materials”) quadrupled. Here again, research demonstrates that parents will customize a child’s learning experience when they have the opportunity to purchase different services and items, and education savings accounts are meaningfully different from K–12 private school vouchers.

Policy recommendations

Eligibility. Lawmakers should give every child in their state the option to use an education savings account—and Members of Congress should do the same for K–12 students in Washington, DC, students living within federal jurisdictions, such as tribal lands and attending Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) schools, and children in active-duty military families.

Limiting account access creates a multi-tiered education system where certain families have more and better learning opportunities for their children than others. Furthermore, research on student achievement after the pandemic demonstrate that millions of children are not performing at age- or grade-appropriate levels and need help gaining essential life and academic skills.

^{Nation’s Report Card, “Reading and Mathematics Scores Decline During COVID-19 Pandemic,” 2022, https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/highlights/ltt​/2022/ (accessed October 12, 2022).}

Lawmakers should act with a sense of urgency to help students catch up.

Funding. State officials should transfer a child’s portion of the state education spending formula into a private account that parents use to purchase education products and services. This method is preferable to plans that fund the accounts through annual appropriations, which are subject to legislative spending constraints each year and can require additional taxpayer spending.

Policymakers can follow the models in place in Arizona and now Florida, to name just two, that allow taxpayer spending to follow a child to their public or private learning choices.

Testing. State officials should allow participating private schools to choose the national norm referenced test—such as the Stanford series, the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, or the Classical Learning Test (CLT)—that best matches the institution’s curriculum and report aggregate results after a period of three years. The agency administering the accounts should contract with a survey company to measure parent satisfaction.

These two indicators—aggregate student results over time and parent satisfaction—should serve as the measures of success for account holders. Test results, though, should not determine student or school eligibility for participation in an account program.

Lawmakers should not require account holders to take state tests administered to public school students because such assessments impact instructional choices, thus affecting school officials’ curricular decisions and limiting parental options. Requiring account holders, homeschool students, or private school students to take state tests would produce uniformity, not an account option that allows for customization according to a child’s unique needs.

Conclusion

Every child should have the opportunity to succeed in school and in life. After the pandemic, as researchers report steep learning losses across grade levels and subjects, the call for quality learning options is especially urgent.

^{National Center for Education Statistics, “Reading and Mathematics Scores Decline During COVID-19 Pandemic,” NAEP Long-Term Trend Assessment Results: Reading and Mathematics, https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/highlights/ltt/2022/ (accessed October 31, 2022), and Clare Halloran, Rebecca Jack, James C. Okun and Emily Oster, “Pandemic Schooling Mode and Student Test Scores: Evidence from U.S. States,” National Bureau of Economic Research, November 2021, https://www.nber.org/papers/w29497 (accessed October 31, 2022).}

Education savings accounts empower parents with the ability to meet every family and child’s unique education needs and should be available to all school-aged children. Students need options such as ESAs now more than ever.

Editor’s note: This commentary appeared Monday on nypost.com.

US public-school enrollment fell 3.5% during the two pandemic years — about 1.5 million students — while public charter school rolls jumped 7%, a new report notes. Families are voting with their feet, and if they can’t choose charters they’re leaving public education altogether.

The study commissioned by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools covers the 39 of the 41 states with public charter schools; enrollment rose a total of 240,000 kids, though total US charter rolls are only 3.6 million.

For the 25 states with adequate racial-breakdown data, regular public schools lost 920,000 white, 140,000 Hispanic and 178,000 black students. The number of black kids in charters rose by more than 34,000, Hispanics by 96,000 and whites by about 30,000.

Many white families, presumably with more resources, apparently opted to pay for private or Catholic schools or to do home-schooling — as did some minority families. But it’s obvious that charters kept families of all races in public education.

This puts the lie to the claim that charters kill public education: Rather, they’re its salvation unless and until regular public schools shape up — if the unions and other vested interests will let them.

In New York City and state, charter schools are measurably better than nearby traditional public schools. Students in NYC charter schools that were approved by the State University of New York vastly outperformed traditional public schools on the state’s English and math exams. (That, presumably is why teacher-union allies like Bronx Assemblyman Michael Benedetto want to strip SUNY of its authority to approve charter schools.)

To continue reading, click here.

Editor’s note: This article appeared last week on Arkansas’ kark.com.

The 2023 legislative session is right around the corner in Arkansas, and lawmakers are discussing some important topics that will be on the agenda.

One focus of the upcoming session is on education according to Sen. Bart Hester, president of the Senate Pro Tempore. Much of the conversation surrounding education is specifically centered around school choice.

“We’re going to work on educational freedom, and that’s for every kid in Arkansas,” Hester said. “Our biggest priority in Arkansas is parental empowerment through choice.”

Sen. Joyce Elliott is leaving the Legislature once the 2023 session rolls around, however she said she still believes the focus needs to be more on public schools rather than school choice.

“We can do better if we decide to,” Elliott said. “It’s about priorities.”

Hester said this session, lawmakers could consider ways to get certain students out of their zoned district, if needed for those students, and send them to private schools through scholarships.

He said his focus is on educating a child rather than protecting an institution: “I want to focus on money following a child and educating a child not supporting some institution.”

To continue reading, click here.

The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals, which last month upheld the constitutionality of the Hope Scholarship education choice program, issued on Thursday a 49-page majority decision that a traditional public education system and the statewide education savings account program can operate concurrently without violating the state constitution.

Justice Tim Armstead wrote:

“… we find that the West Virginia Constitution does not prohibit the Legislature from enacting the Hope Scholarship Act in addition to providing for a thorough and efficient system of free schools. The Constitution allows the Legislature to do both of these things.”

The Supreme Court directed the lower court to rule in favor of parents and the state.

The opinion, which was not unanimous, came in response to a lower court ruling in favor of education opponents challenging the new law, which the Legislature enacted in 2021 to establish the Hope Scholarship Program. The program allows parents to remove their children from traditional public schools and apply to the state for about $4,300, which can be directed to private school tuition, home education, and other pre-approved expenses.

More than 3,000 families had applied earlier this year, but weeks before school was set to begin, a circuit judge ruled the program unconstitutional and halted its operation. The decision sent parents scrambling to find alternatives in time for the start of the 2022-23 academic year.

On Oct. 6, the high court issued a one-page order finding the Hope Scholarship Program constitutional and allowed it to move forward. The opinion released Thursday was the full opinion.

Attorneys for one group of education choice supporters said the opinion shows what choice supporters across the United States have argued all along in making their case for giving parents the right to determine the best educational fit for their children.

“The West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals confirmed what state court after state court has found,” said Joshua House, an attorney with the Institute for Justice, a public interest legal organization intervening on behalf of two parents seeking Hope Scholarships for their children. “The constitutional requirement to provide for public schools is a floor, not a ceiling. West Virginia has to provide public schools, but it can give parents other options, too.”

One of the parents, Katie Switzer, whose child has a speech disorder that she thinks could be better addressed at a private school, praised the opinion.

“We're really excited to have this in writing,” Switzer said in a statement issued by the Institute for Justice. “This helps us have confidence moving forward to make decisions about the best education for our children.”

The opinion in favor of education savings accounts comes after 21 states established or expanded education choice programs last year.

Editor’s note: This article appeared Wednesday on thecentersquare.com.

Parents of students from across the state involved with the state's Invest In Kids school choice pilot program are lobbying Illinois lawmakers to make it permanent.

The program allows donors to get a 75% income tax credit toward donations to fund school choice scholarships for qualified families throughout the state. Scholarship Granting Organizations are approved to administer the program, which is set to sunset Jan. 1, 2024. As lawmakers return, parents are looking for an extension.

Eric Ruiz of Joliet, a parent with students attending a private school involved in the program, explained his goal of coming to Springfield.

"We are hoping to get rid of the sunset date and make this a permanent thing," Ruiz said. "We do not know what the future holds, so I would like my kids to remain there."

Trip Rodgers, superintendent for Lutheran Schools in central Illinois, said that students who usually would not get a chance at private school can with the program.

"Over the last couple of years, we have seen an increase in the number of students who can attend our school," Rodgers said. "Many of these students in the past would not have been able to do it financially."

Anthony Holter, president of the scholarship granting organization Empower Illinois, said 100% of the scholarships are based on need, with 70% of recipients having the most financial need.

To continue reading, click here.

Editor’s note: This article appeared Monday on the74million.org.

Kristy Maxwell realized something had to change the day she picked her son Levi up from school and found out his teacher had left the autistic kindergartener alone crying and throwing pencils from under his desk.

The Michigan mom switched her son to a school that had a good reputation serving students with disabilities, but things didn’t improve. Because Levi was a “math whiz,” staff ignored his trouble socializing and his difficulty handling the cafeteria’s loud noises, Maxwell said.

Meanwhile, she was unsuccessful in lobbying the school to screen her child for autism, a way to secure the extra services required by law for students with disabilities. The mother worried her son might never get the learning support he needed.

Then, in March 2020, the pandemic shifted all classes at his school online and forced the family into an accidental experiment in a new model of education.

During remote school, Levi could get one-on-one attention sitting next to his mother, who had to temporarily stop her work as a massage therapist due to COVID. His younger sister, who struggles with anxiety, could take breaks to pet the family’s dogs.

“When everything shut down and we were forced to go virtual … my two younger kids did really well,” Maxwell said. “We decided after doing that, since the younger two kids did so well outside of a brick-and-mortar [school], keeping them virtual would be the best way to help them academically.”

The Maxwells, whose three kids are now 9, 11 and 15, are among the thousands of families across the U.S. that tried virtual learning for the first time during the pandemic and are now staying with it.

New data indicate that online schools have had a staying power beyond the pandemic that few observers suspected. While some virtual academies have operated for decades, they saw a well-documented enrollment explosion in 2020-21, the first full school year after COVID, as many virus-wary parents looked to protect their children from infections and anti-mask families sought a way out of face-covering requirements.

But in the following year, even as brick-and-mortar schools fully reopened and mask mandates fell, remote schools mostly maintained their pandemic enrollment gains — and in many cases added new seats.

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Editor’s note: This commentary from Jay Mathews, an education columnist for the Washington Post and creator of the annual Challenge Index rankings of American high schools, appeared Sunday on washingtonpost.com.

The current debate over schools puzzles me. Much of the talk is about the need for more parent rights and more parent choice. Some people fail to recognize that parental decisions are at least as, if not more, important than anything else going on in schools these days.

Parents want their children to acquire skills that will pay their bills and develop resourcefulness to handle tough times in their lives. Parents look for schools with good teachers who can help with that.

Most make their school choices based not on their politics but on what is going on in those classrooms.

The alleged lessons on race and sex that are being debated don’t matter to them as much as progress in reading and math.

Decades of educational research show that increased achievement in our schools is tied to rising living standards. The fact that parents have been working hard, doing better financially and supporting school improvements helps explain significant gains in U.S. learning from 1971 to 2017, according to researchers M. Danish Shakeel and Paul E. Peterson.

The pandemic has set that back, but there has been no decline in parental eagerness for good teaching. Mothers and fathers will demand that schools recover the gains lost and won’t rest until that happens.

Parents often gravitate to schools in the most affluent neighborhoods, where average test scores are high. But that focus on nice suburbs overlooks what is happening in communities on the other end of the income scale.

The largest and one of the most academically successful public charter school networks in the country is KIPP. It began in 1994 with 49 students in one elementary school classroom in a poor part of Houston. Today, it has 120,000 students, 88% of them low-income.

The similarly high-scoring IDEA public charter network began in 1998 with 75 mostly low-income students in Donna, Tex., near the Mexican border. That network now has 80,000 students, 87% of whom are economically disadvantaged.

How did those students get into those great schools? Their parents enrolled them. Mothers and fathers recognize that KIPP and IDEA are among several charter networks, and some regular public schools far from rich neighborhoods, distinguishing themselves academically.

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Editor’s note: This commentary from Jonathan Butcher, the Will Skillman Fellow in Education at The Heritage Foundation and a reimaginED guest blogger, and Madison Marino, research associate and project coordinator at the Heritage’s Center for Education Policy, appeared Wednesday on washingtontimes.com.

Last summer, when Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey signed a law that made Empowerment Scholarship Accounts an option for all children in the state, special interest groups panicked.

Save Our Schools Arizona launched a referendum campaign, urging citizens to “vote for public schools” and support “our kids and our communities” by opposing the expansion. Yet SOS couldn’t gather enough signatures to put its proposal on the ballot.

It’s not that SOS didn’t have plenty of resources to qualify the measure. It’s just that families across the state think the accounts are what Arizona parents and students need.

“I’ve had so many conversations with neighbors and church friends, and it seems to come up everywhere,” said Annie Meade, mother of four and new account holder. “My neighbors who send their children to public school … are really happy for me to have more choices for my kids,” she said.

With Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, Ms. Meade and other participating families can use a portion of their child’s funds from the state K-12 education funding formula to purchase education products and services for their children. The money may be used to pay for online classes, textbooks, school uniforms, private school tuition, and more.

Ms. Meade will use accounts for three of her children and send her fourth to a charter school. The money will be used to pay tuition and expenses at a microschool, a small private school, along with curricular materials, music lessons and physical education classes.

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PEMBROKE PINES, Fla. – Danny Villegas knew that if South Florida wanted to develop the kind of elite soccer talent found in Europe, it would have to offer more than the usual part-time coaching and training – and reach more than just the kids from wealthier families.

So five years ago, he joined his friend Djems “DJ” Lima, who had come up with a concept that, in this era of increasingly customized education, is still surprisingly kind of rare: A K-12 school for athletes.

At the soccer-focused Pathway Schools, “We’re making better humans, better students, and better players,” said Villegas, a high school soccer star in Miami who went on to play professional soccer in Mexico, Brazil and the U.S.

The idea for Pathway “came out of me realizing I can’t develop a high-level athlete without working on all the components,” said Lima, who played soccer in college and earned a degree in business management. “With eight hours in a focused environment, we can really cater to the kids’ needs. Not just the athletic aspect, but the academic aspect and the mental aspect.”

A school for athletes can take promising young players to the next level.

School choice can help ensure even more promising young players have that opportunity.

Pathway has three campuses in South Florida that share the brand but have separate owners. Altogether, they serve about 75 students, most of them in middle and high school.

Villegas owns the one in the city of Pembroke Pines, in the vast patchwork of semi-tropical suburbia that is Broward County. It’s hard to imagine how he could have secured a better facility.

Pathway rents space on the south campus of Broward College, a state college that decided in 2020 to end its athletic programs. Pathway students have access to the college’s academic and athletic facilities, including its gym, locker rooms and soccer field.

Thanks to school choice, Pathway Schools will be financially accessible to a broad range of students.

Sixteen of the 24 students at the Pembroke site use income-based school choice scholarships. (Those scholarships are administered by nonprofits such as Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.) The other two campuses are in the process of meeting state regulations for educational facilities so they can accept scholarship students next year.

Having those students “will make our impact that much greater,” Villegas said. “Some of the most talented soccer kids often don’t have the money.”

Marilyn Hawthorne said without a choice scholarship, she probably wouldn’t have been able to enroll her 16-year-old son, Emerson Butcher. Hawthorne is a nurse and single mom with two other children, both of them in college.

Pathway is perfect for Emerson, she said, and not only because he’s getting expert coaching. The 11^th-grader is also getting the preparation and motivation he needs to excel academically, something he wasn’t doing at his prior school.

“My son is very bright, but he didn’t have much interest in school,” Hawthorne said. Pathway turned out to be “the right place at the right time. He has 100 percent turned it around.”

For its core academic curriculum, Pathway relies on Florida Virtual School. FLVS is the nation’s largest state-run virtual school, and it has long enjoyed an excellent reputation for academic quality. Pathway supplements FLVS with a team of on-site instructors who can offer one-on-one help.

The typical day’s schedule is soccer training in the morning, followed by four hours of academics, followed by soccer training in the afternoon. The school does not field its own club or travel teams – “We’re club neutral,” Villegas said – but all of its students play on top teams in soccer-rich South Florida.

The goal for Pathway students is to play at least at the college level – and to earn college scholarships in order to do that. To that end, Pathway students can’t participate in soccer training unless they maintain As and Bs in every class.

“When they’re motivated by what they love, which is soccer, they’ll do what they need to do,” Villegas said. “They realize, ‘Whoa, they’re holding me accountable.’ We’re a soccer school. But grades are important.”

Pathway Schools also put a lot of focus on non-academic skills, including self-discipline, emotional maturity, and mental toughness. At his campus in another Broward city, Coconut Creek, Lima has his students read Angela Duckworth’s “Grit,” about resolve and resilience, and the motivational business classic “Who Moved My Cheese?”

The schools are not only proving popular with hard-core soccer players in South Florida. They may be a template for education entrepreneurs in Florida and other choice-rich states who want to cater to their own athletic niches.

“When we meet kids where they’re at, and we align with their passions, it’s their dream school,” Villegas said. “They never thought this could be a reality.”

Eleventh-grader Zoe Burger was in a traditional private school before she enrolled in Pathway last year. She recently traveled to Peru after getting an invitation to play with the 17-year-old-and-younger Peruvian national team. She has also traveled to Europe to watch top-tier soccer there. She said she loves the training and competition at Pathway, and the flexibility that comes with FLVS.

“I don’t have to stress about assignments being done the same day,” Zoe said. “If I was in a regular school, I would get kicked out.” (To be clear, Zoe is no slacker. She’s already taken two Advanced Placement classes and plans to take more her senior year.)

Ninth-grader Madison Stewart was in a district school two years ago, and in FLVS full time last year. The latter was good academically but left a void. “I missed the social aspect,” she said. “It was hard doing school alone.”

When her mom told her about Pathway, Madison thought it was too good to be true. “I want to go as far with soccer as I can,” she said. “If there’s a school for it, why would I not go there?”

Emerson Butcher said the atmosphere at Pathway has been especially good for him.

His grades weren’t the best in his prior public school, he said. But now he has no choice but to make A’s and B’s.

“I’m going to be honest: I’m a class clown. But here, I’m more focused,” Emerson said. “There’s a lot of motivation because I love playing soccer.”

Editor’s note: This article appeared Wednesday on the74million.org. To read an analysis of the survey from Patrick Gibbons, manager of policy and public affairs at Step Up For Students, click here.

More than half of the 3,115 parents who participated in a spring survey said they prefer to direct and curate their child’s education rather than rely entirely on their local school system, results showed.

Conducted by Tyton Partners, an investment banking and consulting firm that examines pandemic-related shifts in education, and funded in part by the Walton Family Foundation and Stand Together Trust, the survey was released Oct. 26. It comes after parents had courtside seats to various aspects of their children’s learning during the pandemic, prompting many — from myriad backgrounds and political affiliations — to push for change.

“What we’re hearing from parents loud and clear is they feel a greater sense of ownership over their child’s education,” said Christian Lehr, a senior principal in Tyton’s strategy consulting practice. “The last two years have been incredibly difficult. Now, parents are actively searching for new experiences that will deliver on academic promises, yes, but also bring joy and delight.”

Fifty-nine percent of participants said their educational preferences changed post-pandemic: 51% said personal interest and needs should drive a child’s education rather than grade-level requirements.

Nearly 80% said learning can and should happen anywhere.

Some parent groups, frustrated by underperforming schools, have advocated for the types of change they feel will propel children of color and other marginalized groups. Many don’t have a political agenda while others are openly partisan: Conservative parents are driving change from within the public school system, pushing for certain texts — often those that concern issues of race and gender — to be pulled from the classroom. Left-leaning suburban families have organized against this trend.

Others still, unhappy with districts’ remote learning options during the pandemic, removed their children from the public school system entirely. And while some have returned to campus, virtual school enrollment figures remain high.

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