It’s a choice about what you study, who teaches it and how fast you can move from high school to a credential and a career. That hidden-in-plain-sight choice is dual enrollment — high school students taking college courses for credit.

is an opportunity to point out that dual enrollment is one of the largest and fastest-growing forms of public school choice in America. It’s a school choice growth story that no one’s talking about.

The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center recently a modest increase in college undergraduate enrollment in fall 2025 — about 1%, driven by a 3% increase in community college enrollment. Buried inside those headlines is a key driver of that community college growth.

More high school students are enrolling in college courses through dual enrollment. The total increased 5.9% (about 66,000 additional students) last fall, reaching 1.19 million. That represents nearly 1 in 5 community college students. That is not a boutique program. That is a system.

Look beyond community colleges, and the picture is even bigger. A Community College Research Center shows that in the 2023-24 academic year, there were 2.8 million dual enrollment students nationwide, a 12.7% increase over the prior year (about 300,000 additional students).

That analysis also reports that community colleges serve about 71% of all dual-enrolled students. And in some states — for example, — high schoolers make up more than half of community college enrollments.

School choice is often treated as an exit strategy: You leave your assigned school for another academic option. Dual enrollment works differently. It expands opportunity inside public education, often without requiring a family to move, win a lottery or navigate a complex school choice marketplace.

In other words, dual enrollment is school choice by another name: course choice at scale. It gives students the power to choose advanced academic coursework, career and technical courses or early college classes, sometimes taught at a college, sometimes at a high school campus and increasingly online. For many young people, the last years of high school effectively become the first year of college.

Dual enrollment functions like school choice in at least four practical ways:

• It lets young people choose courses and pathways, not just buildings. A student can opt into college algebra, emergency medical tech coursework, welding or introductory psychology while still anchored in a familiar school community.
  
• It expands opportunity in rural and small districts. Where there may be only one high school, dual enrollment, especially through hybrid or online delivery, can dramatically widen access to advanced courses.
  
• It creates choice across K-12, higher education and the workforce. The best models link course sequences to degrees, certificates and regional labor market demand.
  
• It is scalable and public. Dual enrollment often leverages institutions that already exist, especially community colleges, making it one of the fastest ways to expand opportunity without building a new system from scratch.

Done well, dual enrollment gives students a first taste of college-level expectations, lowers the cost of a credential and accelerates the path to a good first job. It is one of the few interventions that can reduce both the time and price of postsecondary attainment while building confidence — especially for first-generation students who benefit from early proof that they are capable of college.

Dual enrollment students are to finish high school, enter postsecondary education and complete college degrees than their non-dual-enrolled peers. And participation is associated with better college outcomes for Black and Hispanic students.

But averages conceal disparities and design flaws. Dual enrollment can devolve into what many educators quietly recognize as random acts of dual credit. This occurs when a scattering of classes doesn’t add up to a credential, credits don’t transfer cleanly, there is uneven rigor across sites and equity gaps widen instead of closing. Choice without structure can become confusing.

If phase one of dual enrollment was about scale, phase two must be about coherence that turns participation into mobility. Here are five ways that would protect choice while increasing quality and payoff.

Promote set pathways, not just random courses. Group classes into simple, step-by-step plans that end in something that counts: transferable college credit, a short credential that applies to a degree or job-linked courses in fields that are hiring.

Make credit transfers count automatically. Publish clear “this course counts as that course” lists across colleges and set statewide rules so students don’t lose credits when they move from one campus to another.

Treat advising as part of the program, not an add-on. Students need help choosing courses that fit their workload, match their goals and will still matter after graduation — otherwise, they may rack up credits that don’t help.

Protect quality and show results plainly. Set clear expectations for course rigor and instruction, then report basic data: who enrolls, who passes and whether credits actually move students toward degrees or credentials.

Build access in from the start. Remove fees, ensure access to transportation and the internet, recruit students who are often left out and provide tutoring — so dual enrollment narrows gaps instead of widening them.

Dual enrollment doesn’t fit neatly into the usual school choice categories. It isn’t a charter school or a different district school. It isn’t an education savings account for a private school. It isn’t homeschooling.

It is a public, cross-institutional strategy that expands options without requiring students to abandon their schools. That’s exactly why it deserves a bigger place in the National School Choice Week story.

School choice is ultimately about giving young people more ways to build a future that fits them. One of the most powerful forms of choice today may be the one that simply lets students begin college — intentionally, coherently and with support — while they’re still in high school.

Tennessee House and Senate education committees passed the governor’s private-school voucher program Tuesday, speeding the $450 million first-year expense to final votes before week’s end.

Senators voted 8-1 to send the measure to the finance committee to be considered Wednesday.

Senate Majority Leader Jack Johnson, a Franklin Republican carrying the bill for Gov. Bill Lee, told lawmakers the plan will “empower families to do something for their kid, fulfilling needs we’re not meeting with this public school system that we run together with our local folks.”

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Johnson claimed a mandate to pass the measure from President Donald Trump, who posted on his Truth Social platform earlier that he supports Tennessee lawmakers’ efforts to adopt “school choice.”

“It is our goal to bring education in the United States to the highest level, one that it has never attained before,” Trump said in his post.

Lee’s plan, which is zooming toward final votes in a special session this week, calls for providing more than $7,000 each to 20,000 students statewide and then expanding by about 5,000 annually. Half of those students in the first year could come from families with incomes at 300% of the federal poverty level, an estimated $175,000 for a family of four, while the rest would have no income limit. No maximum income would be placed on the program after the first year.

A financial analysis by the state’s Fiscal Review Committee determined K-12 schools will lose $45 million and that only $3.3 million would go toward 12 school districts most likely to lose students.

Senate Minority Leader Raumesh Akbari of Memphis was the lone vote against the bill as she urged the committee to “exercise a bit more caution.” Akbari reminded senators that students participating in the state’s education savings account program, which provides vouchers to enroll in private schools in Davidson, Hamilton and Shelby counties, are performing worse academically than their peers.

In contrast, Republican Sen. Adam Lowe of Calhoun said standardized tests shouldn’t be the deciding factor in passing the bill. Lowe also told Hawkins County Schools Director Matt Hixson he shouldn’t be worried about talk that some local leaders in upper East Tennessee believe they have to support the voucher bill or the legislature could refuse to approve $420 million for Hurricane Helene disaster relief.

The House panel endorsed the plan on a 17-7 vote after Republican lawmakers used a procedural move to bypass debate on the bill. Rep. Jake McCalmon of Williamson County called for an immediate vote following public testimony, backed by Rep. William Slater of Sumner County. The move kept opponents from questioning the bill’s sponsor, House Majority Leader William Lamberth.

Democratic Rep. Gloria Johnson of Knoxville called the move “ridiculous” afterward because of the impact the bill could have on public schools and the state’s budget.

In addition to complaining that the state will be running two school systems and likely hitting financial problems, Johnson challenged Lamberth’s assertion that the bill will make public schools “whole” when they lose students to the private-school voucher program.

Lamberth, though, said public schools would not lose “one red cent” as a result of the program.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Tennessee Lookout maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Holly McCall for questions: info@tennesseelookout.com.

It is no exaggeration to say parents today have more educational options for their children than at any time in history. Just last year, expanded access to traditional public, public charter, public magnet, private, online, home and nontraditional schools. These expansions followed a record-breaking 2023, when 20 states increased school choice options.

But are parents nationwide taking advantage of these opportunities? The reality is more complex than a simple yes or no.

New from the National School Choice Awareness Foundation, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit I lead, shows 60% of U.S. parents say they considered a new or different school for at least one of their children last year. While school searching has leveled off somewhat from its post-COVID high of , it is still robust. Encouragingly, a higher percentage of parents this year (60%) said they had recently discussed schooling options with friends and family, a 10-percentage-point .

However, hidden within this data is a warning sign: Of those parents who explored new options, only 28% ultimately enrolled their children in a different school. 

suggest that particular barriers often prevent parents from following through, even when options are available. These include a lack of transportation, financial constraints, confusion over enrollment processes and simply a lack of time to apply.

As a movement, we cannot ignore the difficulties families face. It is time to match the growing quantity of school choice options with resources and tools to help parents navigate them. 

That is why, over the past three years, the National School Choice Awareness Foundation has expanded its efforts beyond organizing National School Choice Week. Each January, we now host the nation’s largest online portfolio of school navigation resources, available in English and Spanish. These programs — and — equip millions of families each year with the information they need to explore their options.

But no single organization can, or should, do this work alone. Groups such as Families Empowered, GuidED Florida, Love Your School, NavigatED Arizona and PA Families for Education Choice, along with the other members of the newly formed , are making a tremendous impact by directly answering parents’ inquiries on a one-on-one basis. For the school choice movement to thrive, these organizations must continue to grow.

Communicating effectively with families and guiding them through the often overwhelming process of finding and enrolling in the best educational fit for their children is just as critical as policy advocacy. Yet, many organizations doing this vital work are struggling — not because of a lack of vision or impact, but because they don’t fit into traditional nonprofit funding models.

This National School Choice Week, there is much to celebrate. We are thrilled that 9 million students, parents, educators and supporters will participate in tens of thousands of events nationwide. However, we are also aware that some of the hardest work lies ahead. Together, we can bridge the gap between opportunity and access, helping families navigate their choices and ensuring that every child crosses the finish line of a great education and a successful future. 

In January, the National School Choice Awareness Foundation published a asking 2,873 parents questions about changing their child’s school. About 60% of respondents said they considered a new school in 2024, but only 28% made a change. 

Of those who did transfer their kids, 28% chose a traditional public school, 31% selected a public charter or magnet school, nearly 14% chose a private or religious school and 27% opted for online schooling, homeschooling or a microschool.

Interest in homeschooling, hybrid learning and microschools in particular skyrocketed among respondents this year, compared with answers to similar surveys given from 2022 to 2024. Nearly two-thirds of parents thought about homeschooling, up from 23%, while interest in microschools and hybrid learning jumped from 5% to 16%. The percentage of those thinking about private schools rose from 29% to 36%.

By contrast, parents were less likely to consider traditional public schools than they were in previous surveys: 35%, down from an average of 45%.

But when it came to actually switching schools, the one-third of parents who followed through with the decision tended to choose public-sector schools, according to the survey. Nearly 60% of them selected a district, public charter or magnet school. 

About 30% chose private schools, homeschooling, microschools or hybrid schools, while 10% selected a full-time online education.

“The percentage of parents who enrolled their children in private-sector schools … remains relatively low,” Shelby Doyle, vice president of the National School Choice Awareness Foundation, said in a press release. “This may be due to the cost of attendance for families, even with the expansion of private school choice programs such as education savings accounts.”

Private school growth is still surging across the U.S., with GOP lawmakers in close to a dozen states having it as a top priority for 2025, according to ‘s private school choice tracker. Currently, 28 states and the District of Columbia supply public funds for parents to spend on educational options outside of public schools — and that number is likely to rise, according to the tracker.

The new survey shows that the percentage of parents searching for different schools declined this past year, down from 72% in the survey released in January 2024. But it still remains higher than the 50% among respondents to the 2022 and 2023 surveys.

Military families, younger parents and Black parents were among the most likely to consider new schools for their children last year. About 40% of parents surveyed said they were likely to continue their search for a new school in 2025, with Asian and Black parents indicating the most interest. 

“It took the joy out of teaching and learning.”

McClymont became a stay-at-home mom and planned to homeschool her daughter, but she missed the classroom. In the fall of 2023, she began leading a learning pod with three children in her neighborhood. That was when she heard about microschools, or the intentionally small, low cost, often mixed-age learning communities that have gained widespread popularity in recent years. She was immediately attracted to microschooling’s focus on flexibility and personalized learning, and knew for certain that she wanted to launch her own microschool. But where should she begin? 

Most microschool founders are teachers like McClymont who previously worked in conventional schools. According to a by the National Microschooling Center, more than 70 percent of today’s microschool operators are current or former licensed educators. These founders have deep knowledge of curriculum and pedagogy and a passion for teaching and learning, but most of them have never run a small business. 

They are looking for ways to bridge the gap between being an educator and an entrepreneur, and new microschool accelerator programs are helping them to do just that.

“Put me in a classroom anywhere and I can teach all day. I got that. I was looking for all those business tips and tricks,” said Tonya Kipe, founder of in Polk City, Florida. A public elementary school teacher for more than a decade, Kipe grew her microschool from one student in January 2024 to 26 students today, including those with special learning needs. Participating in , a Florida-based nonprofit microschool accelerator, was a key part of Kipe Academy’s growth. 

Created by former public school teacher Iman Alleyne in 2022, Launch Your Kind supports the development of new microschools — especially those that celebrate diversity, inclusivity, and joyful learning. 

After launching her own microschool, , in 2016, Alleyne wished she had an affordable, model-agnostic school accelerator program available to her to provide the business skills, entrepreneurial insights, and community support that she lacked. She wanted to streamline the startup process for new founders, enabling them to avoid common pitfalls and build sustainable small businesses. “I teach them to take care of their teacher hat, but their business owner hat needs to come on too,” she said. 

The 10-week program provides online, cohort-style coaching for about a dozen new or aspiring microschool founders, and continued support thereafter. Through weekly check-ins and expert presentations, they learn the business of running a school, ranging from establishing policies and procedures and finding a suitable school location to setting tuition prices, exploring various revenue streams, and being fiscally responsible. Alleyne’s goal is to help microschools flourish and grow, and she helps founders to merge their love of teaching with a keen sense of what it takes to run a successful enterprise. Most Launch Your Kind founders launch or expand their microschools within six months of participating in the program, with each cohort community remaining in close contact long after the program ends — including through an annual in-person retreat. Launch Your Kind’s winter cohort begins later this month.

For Kipe, participating in Launch Your Kind helped her to see that entrepreneurship can be a win-win for herself and the students she serves. “We want to serve the community, but we’re also a business,” Kipe realized. 

Like most of the Florida microschools that have participated in Launch Your Kind, Kipe Academy’s students attend at reduced tuition rates thanks to the state’s robust school choice programs that enable education dollars to follow students to their desired learning setting — including microschools and homeschooling centers. Family financial accessibility is an important priority for the microschool founders with whom Alleyne works. It’s also Alleyne’s priority with Launch Your Kind. “I really wanted to put together an accelerator that would be at a price point that people could afford,” said Alleyne, who has received philanthropic support from organizations such as Stand Together Trust, Getting Smart, VELA, and the Yass Prize, which has helped to defray participant costs. 

After discovering microschooling in 2023 while running her learning pod, McClymont saw a post on social media by Kipe mentioning Launch Your Kind. She connected with Alleyne and joined the next accelerator cohort in 2024, growing her program, , from three students to 13. She serves both neurodiverse and neurotypical students in her current microschool location in West Sunrise, Florida, and is in the process of opening a second location in Coral Springs. She credits the accelerator program as a primary reason for her early success and continued growth. “To be a teacher is one thing; to be an entrepreneur and run a successful microschool is another. There were a lot of things that I didn’t know, like certain legalities, marketing, and just the logistics of how to run the company,” said McClymont, adding that the connection to a small community of founders within the Launch Your Kind cohort was also invaluable. 

One piece of entrepreneurial input was particularly helpful. “I was grossly undercharging myself and Iman had to have a conversation with me,” recalled McClymont. “She told me, ‘you are undercharging for what you have to offer and you need to raise your prices. Yes, you’re doing this out of the goodness of your heart but you’re running a business now.’” For McClymont, that type of candid feedback was exactly what she needed to take her business to the next level to serve even more students throughout South Florida. Adopting a solid business mindset was how McClymont would be able to do the most good for the most students. “I think that’s something that a lot of educators probably struggle with,” she added.

McClymont has observed significant academic and social-emotional gains in her students, and plans to continue to open new microschools as parent demand grows. She is also considering the possibility of creating a franchise model to help other educators launch their own Tree Stars Learning locations without having to start from scratch. 

She said she thinks the microschooling movement is just beginning: “I feel like we are the Uber of taxis: I believe that microschools are going to take over. Especially in South Florida, parents are looking for other options because they see how the public school is not serving their child. It’s getting to a point where they have to close down some public schools here. Parents are seeking other options, and I just want to be a positive light.”

After decades of frustration with traditional schools, after a pandemic that magnified the inadequacies and inequities of public education, and now with the rapid expansion of school choice programs in multiple states, entrepreneurs are remaking public education with a dizzying array of innovative models. These are ever more customized to the students they serve, ever more responsive to families who want something different and, thanks to school choice, easier than ever to sustain and scale.

Black education entrepreneurs are in the thick of this phenomenon.

The essence of school choice is freedom — the freedom for parents to choose, for teachers to innovate and for students to thrive in environments that best suit their individual needs. Black school founders are not just participating in this movement; they are at the forefront, championing the creation of educational spaces that not only meet academic standards, but nurture cultural identity, community cohesion and holistic development.

Black-founded schools are diverse in terms of curriculum, pedagogy and school type. They include incredible charter schools like in New Orleans, in California and outside Washington D.C.; highly regarded private schools like in Maryland and in Oklahoma; and innovative microschools like and in Memphis. There are STEM-focused schools like in Las Vegas; STEM-based and African-centered schools like in Brooklyn; and even more eclectic schools like Florida’s , which fuses project- and nature-based learning with flexible scheduling.

However, the journey of Black school founders is not devoid of challenges. They often grapple with hurdles like limited access to funding, bureaucratic red tape and the daunting task of dispelling long-held stereotypes. Yet, their resilience is as evident as their success. Through innovative funding models, community partnerships and relentless advocacy, these educators are not just overcoming barriers; they are dismantling them.

In 2023, a movement of parents and advocates across the country continued to extend school choice — and not just as a concept, but as a reality for parents who are struggling with options as well as opportunity. State leaders expanded programs that allowed more families to select which learning institution is right for their child, and educators on the ground stepped up to increase available options.

Public charter schools and homeschooling expanded across the country in 2023, as did online classes. This development marked a dramatic change for underprivileged students without good local options or transportation, giving them access — using nothing but the internet — to the greatest educational minds in the country.

And then there are ESAs, Education Savings Accounts, which exploded in 2023 thanks, in large part, to the efforts of Black women in states like Arizona — the first state to make ESAs available to all students. There, groups like Black Mothers’ Forum work to champion their children’s rights and to bring awareness to concerns unique to the underprivileged community and to break cycles of generational poverty. 

The school-to-prison pipeline is real, and Black and Brown students are suspended and expelled from school at two to three times the rate of their white peers due to zero-tolerance policies. School choice is a way out. Using ESAs, the Black Mothers’ Forum is working at the intersection of these societal issues. and has established a chain of microschools all around Arizona. They hope to take the same success to Texas.

ESAs differ from vouchers, placing all of a student’s educational funding into a private account that parents can draw on to pay for private school tuition, or to fund a specialized education to address special needs. ESAs can help cover the cost of tutoring, books, technology — whatever families, who are best positioned to know their communities’ and children’s struggles, decide. ESAs put them in charge.

Black education entrepreneurs not only care about children’s outcomes, but they have seen, firsthand, what educational choice means for their communities — and they know how to make the necessary changes. Their models are innovative, they’re creative, they’re aggressive and, most of all, they are successful. 

Education reformers, policymakers and entrepreneurs can only expect more in 2024. The rapid expansion of school choice has created fertile ground for more innovation in education. The country should be ready to embrace changes pioneered by those best positioned to know what works — most importantly, parents.

Parents are increasingly considering new schooling options for their kids, according to a survey released this month. After exploring available choices, a smaller number of families ultimately selected new schools but a majority reported wanting more information about school choice. 

Both local and out-of-district traditional public schools remained popular among school-searching families, followed by charter schools, private and religious schools and homeschooling.

The results come from that included 2,595 parents of school-aged children conducted by The National School Choice Awareness Foundation and the National School Choice Resource Center (Navigate), which run . 

They began administering this survey right after COVID hit to learn more about how the pandemic impacted parents’ views around school choice and to determine how to best support families as they navigated their options. 

“The big takeaway here is families want options for their kids,” foundation CEO Andrew Campanella said. “They’re looking at their options, but the lens through which they view choice is significantly different than the way people involved in the policy world look at it.”

Overall, about three-quarters of parents surveyed said they’d at least “considered” new schools for a child last year— a 35% increase over 2022. Ultimately, 44% of parents selected a new school. Just under two-thirds reported wanting more information about their options.

The results were released to coincide with National School Choice Week, which began Sunday and will run through Jan. 27. They also come as public schools across the nation face enrollment declines of over 1 million students, according to an , which showed lasting disengagement from public schools. 

The National School Choice Awareness Foundation defines school choice as empowering parents to select the schools and learning environments that best meet their children’s needs including traditional public schools, charter schools and private schools.

They do not identify as a policy advocacy organization and say they do not promote one schooling option over another. Campanella, the CEO, previously served in a senior-level position at the American Federation for Children, a school choice advocacy group founded by the DeVos family that heavily lobbies for directing taxpayer money toward private school options.

There are a number of reasons that parents are researching new schools, according to Inga Cotton, the founder and executive director of San Antonio Charter Moms, a non-profit advocacy group that supports parents and caregivers as they explore schooling options. 

In San Antonio, for example, she hears from parents who are frustrated that their local public schools are not offering accelerated enough curriculum to prepare their kids for college. In other cases, families of color are grappling with the consequences of redlining and discrimination. In these areas in particular, it can be harder to access advanced coursework. 

Cotton said she also supports families who have kids with disabilities whose schools might not have the resources necessary to support their needs. Finally, some families are looking for schools with values that align with their own, including progressive ideologies, classical education or religious-centered learning. 

Other advocates point to a string of Republican states adopting or expanding tax credit scholarships, education savings accounts or vouchers, which they see as siphoning funds from public schools, coupled with a wave of partisan criticism of public schools and teachers fed by volatile conflicts over remote learning, mask mandates and classroom content.

The survey results note that “traditional public schools remain popular among school searching families” with just over half of parents considering new schools reporting that they visited, asked about or researched their local public schools. Just under 30% reported the same for public schools outside of their neighborhood. The numbers were slightly lower for charter schools (28%), private or faith-based schools (24%), homeschools (20%), and full-time online schools (22%). 

“This almost fake conflict between district-managed schools and schools that are in the public sector but not managed by districts … is really just a function of a policy debate,” Campanella said. “And it’s not what families are experiencing when they go to make their choices.”

Yet broadening the school choice label to include more controversial items like vouchers, which let parents use taxpayer money to send their kids to private schools, is an intentional choice conservative advocacy organizations are making, according to Joshua Cowen, an education policy professor at Michigan State University.

He believes that while there’s strong bipartisan support for a number of school choice policies, “there’s real skepticism on the use of public funding for private education in the K-12 space,” outside of the conservative base he defined as “Trump dead-enders” or “long-standing anti-government types.”

The National School Choice Awareness Foundation asserted, though, that “school choice is far from partisan, at least when it comes to parents making choices.” The evidence: parents who identified as Democrats chose new schools for their children last year at higher rates than Republican parents (56% to 40%), according to its survey.

A 2022 poll from , an opinion and research journal based out of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, found strikingly different results. ​​Support for the general concept of school choice was starkly partisan, according to their data, with 60% of Republicans and only 41% of Democrats expressing a favorable position.

This is a key example of how question phrasing can impact survey results. Particularly when surveys come from advocacy groups it is important to remain skeptical of data, not because they’re “cooking the books” but because questions can be leading, Cowen said. 

“If you ask, ‘Do you support taxpayer dollars going to church-based schools?’ you’re going to get a very different number than if you say ‘Do you think parents should get to choose within a wide variety of educational options for their kid?’” he said. “Clearly, the second one is going to sound a lot better: you’re going to get more support. And if your goal as an organization is to show numbers with more support, that’s the way you do it.”

The National School Choice Awareness Foundation did not explicitly ask about vouchers in its survey, which was delivered to Survey Monkey’s National Audience panel between Jan. 2-4. Campanella said the survey was solely focused on types of schools rather than mechanisms used to access them, such as vouchers.

He noted they used the survey results to help inform the over 27,000 events the foundation supports across the country for National School Choice Week.

Disclosure: Walton Family Foundation and Stand Together Trust provides financial support to The National School Choice Awareness Foundation and ����Ӱ��.

Microschooling is an education model that is small by design — typically with 15 or fewer students of varying ages per class. It fosters a personalized and community-centric approach to learning that is especially effective in addressing the unique educational needs of diverse student populations. Programs like are helping to fuel these microschools.

ESAs are instrumental in democratizing education. By providing direct funding to parents, they empower families with the financial means to make educational decisions that best suit their children while helping schools outside the conventional system truly flourish.

For example , a growing network in Arizona that focuses on culturally nuanced and inclusive education, is thriving in large part because of the state’s . It serves over 70,000 students statewide in nearly 400 learning environments and makes innovative schools like Black Mothers Forum Microschools far more accessible to families, while inspiring parents to explore the full breadth of education options available for their children.

Opening doors for such exploration is at the heart of the school choice ethos. Whether for a microschool, traditional public school, public magnet school, public charter school, private school, online school or home school, the more options a family can pursue, the better. These will be on full display during , an annual nationwide celebration hosted by the in collaboration with Navigate — The National School Choice Resource Center.

For National School Choice Week, our team is partnering with microschools and organizations across the country to celebrate these new options. For example, Microschool will host a school fair in Nevada to showcase microschools and other choice options. Meanwhile, will host a fun-filled microschool/hybrid/homeschool showcase event with guest speakers, vendors and activities. And in Georgia, will recognize the work parents and volunteers do to make these options possible.

National School Choice Week is, however, far more than just a packed calendar of unique events and activities. The week serves a vital dual purpose: raising awareness about the critical need for increased educational options and providing practical, jargon-free online resources for parents. With saying they will likely be searching for new schools for their children in 2024 and 64% wanting more information about how to exercise their choices, the week acts as a crucial juncture for empowering parents with the knowledge and tools to make informed decisions.

A fundamental shift is taking place in education, and National School Choice Week is shining light on every possible option. As schools and organizations celebrate all that has been accomplished in school choice this past year and embrace this new era of educational innovation in microschooling, ESAs and other school choice programs, the future beams bright with promise. Everyone who supports greater opportunity in education – –from parents to grandparents, educators, advocates, organizational and community leaders to state policymakers– – should recommit to doing all they can to keep this momentum going in 2024 so that, one day, all families will have the full breadth of educational freedom they so rightfully deserve.

LINCOLN — Before a press conference Tuesday promoting a potential state tax break for donors helping low-income parents pay for private school, Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen spoke to 15 students from a Catholic grade school in his hometown.

The governor high-fived students from Columbus St. Anthony, thanked them for joining the “school choice” event and asked them to “pray for the unborn babies.” He said he had come from a meeting on how to reduce abortions in Nebraska.

Pillen then greeted nine conservative state senators who joined him to praise a bill aimed at letting Nebraskans steer tax revenue toward private education.

He said parents with children who don’t find a good fit in a public school setting should have another option, regardless of their income. And he praised the ability of private schools such as St. Anthony to embrace prayer in school.

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“We are the last of two states … that don’t have school choice,” Pillen said. “It is a really critical, fundamental thing that’s got to happen in Nebraska.”

Pillen has said he supports Omaha State Sen. Lou Ann Linehan’s Legislative Bill 753, which would provide up to $25 million a year in income tax credits for “opportunity scholarships” for families that need financial help to attend private school.

On Tuesday, he announced that he had made room for the “school choice” bill in his state budget proposal coming Wednesday. LB 753’s dollar-for-dollar tax credit would allow donors to reduce up to half of their income tax liability each year.

Linehan, who has 30 co-sponsors for her bill, said she sent her kids to public and private schools. She said she wants all Nebraskans to have the same opportunities she had to do what she felt was best for her children.

“There’s nothing more important to a parent than to be able to do the very best for their kid,” she said.

Dunixi Guereca, executive director of Nebraska Stand for Schools, said the Linehan bill is more of a tax break for the wealthy than a way to help education. He said it is an out-of-state idea that is not tailored to Nebraska’s needs.

Guereca and other critics have said the push for “school choice” is a push to use public funds for private schools, as Iowa does. He said it could weaken K-12 public education over time and make hiring and retaining public school teachers more difficult than it already is.

Guereca said taxpayers need to understand the potential impact of a bill that sets aside $25 million a year for a tax credit, because it will be used, and that would mean a loss of $250 million that might be needed for schools or services for kids.

“That’s a lot of money that could be going a lot of places,” Guereca said. “It’s a dollar-for-dollar match. No other charity gets that sort of tax credit. It really isn’t about kids.”

Nehemiah Briggs, a student at Jesuit Academy in North Omaha, said he goes to school with a number of students on scholarships whose families might be helped by lower costs. He talked about his goal of becoming a real estate agent and a millionaire when he grows up.

“I think kids should be able to attend a school like Jesuit or any other private school,” he said. “Not only if they don’t make enough money or don’t have the opportunity to.”

“With $25 million, we could hopefully offer something to all of those families,” he said.

Pillen, asked after the press conference what he would say to people who worry about the impact of this proposal on public schools, said it’s not an either-or situation.

“There have been too many people who have tried to create the dialogue that this is public schools against private schools,” he said. “The reality is we deserve both and we need both.”

The governor said he had not yet had time to evaluate Iowa’s passage of a voucher system in which the money would follow the student.

His goal right now, he said, is to make sure that “education is as equalized across the state as possible, and we need to have school choice.”

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Nebraska Examiner maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Cate Folsom for questions: info@nebraskaexaminer.com. Follow Nebraska Examiner on and .

Families in Eastpoint, Florida, know the answer.

Eastpoint is a commercial fishing village an hour and 40 minutes from Tallahassee on Florida’s “Forgotten Coast.” It has 2,614 people. It’s in a county with 12,451 people. And it now has a distinctive little private school called EDCorps High School. Most of the students there are from working-class families, and nearly all use state-funded choice scholarships.

Private schools like this one have emerged all over rural Florida, many of them in towns as small as Atoka. This is the reality of education choice in rural areas, from a state where it is not an abstraction.

For years, choice opponents in states like Oklahoma, Texas and Iowa — places with a lot of rural heartland but not a lot of private school options — have perpetuated the idea that school choice can’t work in rural areas.

But is that really true?

To find out, my colleague Dava Hankerson and I took a closer look at our own backyard.

Florida has some of the oldest and farthest-reaching private school choice programs in America. Between Miami and Disney, it has vast patchworks of open land, dotted with cattle ranches, orange groves and proud little towns. We focused on the 30 counties the state designates as rural. And we boiled down our findings in a new report, “.” (We also put together about a stellar example of rural choice, Alane Academy in Wauchula, population 5,001.)

Two findings stand out.

First, growing numbers of rural families are benefiting from choice. The number of students using school choice scholarships and education savings accounts topped 8,500 last year, more than triple the participation a decade ago.

But second — and this can’t be highlighted enough — that expansion barely made a dent in the enrollment of rural school districts. This is critical, because many school choice opponents claim that school choice will “kill” rural public schools.

That’s not what’s happening in Florida.

Over the past 10 years, as Florida expanded private school choice more than any state in America, the percentage of rural students in Florida enrolled in private schools climbed 2.4 percentage points, to 6.9%. That’s it, even though more than 70% of Florida families are eligible for choice scholarships.

Rural families in Florida are getting the best of both worlds. The overwhelming majority still choose traditional public schools, which in many cases have ably helped anchor rural communities. (Sixteen of the 30 rural districts earned A or B grades from the state this year; the rest earned C’s.) At the same time, families who need something different are able to access it.

Even in rural areas, supply is growing to meet demand. In the past two decades, the number of private schools in Florida’s rural counties has grown from 69 to 120. These are home-grown schools, in many cases started by former public school teachers with deep roots in their communities.

In Eastpoint, ED Corps High School emphasizes life skills, job skills and industry certifications. The students spend a third of their time outdoors, often working on conservation projects that align with the fishing, forestry and ecotourism industries that are the cornerstone of the local economy.

The school’s director was a public school teacher for 36 years; for seven years, she headed the local teachers union. But now she’s all in for choice, having seen how options can change lives.

A similar story unfolded an hour north.

Bristol is a town of 996 people on the edge of a national forest, in Liberty County, Florida’s most rural. Five years ago, a family of educators with a combined 200 years’ experience working in local public schools started the Gold Star Private Academy. The family didn’t want to tear down the school district; in fact, three of its members were former superintendents. They just wanted to offer a quality option to families who were desperate for a school that was the right fit for their kids.

That’s what they did. All 20 students at Gold Star use state-funded scholarships, and the school has been so popular, it recently moved into a renovated funeral home with three times the space.

Next spring promises to be another key year for school choice legislation across America, and there is no doubt myths about school choice in rural areas will resurface. When they do, I hope lawmakers will see that choice can be a plus for rural America. In rural Florida, it already is.

Critchfield has served on the Idaho State Board of Education for seven years, two of them as president. She also spent several years as a substitute teacher, and served on the rural Cassia County school board for 10 years.

Idaho, while a deep red state politically, is undergoing dramatic change as newcomers arrive in unprecedented numbers, many of them from the West Coast, where the political climate is decidedly different. This makes Idaho an interesting national case study, especially as a new state superintendent takes office, with strong ideas about strengthening her department’s support and oversight of school districts.

Under the Ybarra regime, districts reported receiving little of either support or oversight. As a result, they tended to ignore state mandates. Idaho EdNews assiduously tracked these departmental oversight failures, and districts’ flouting of state regulations.

During the former state chief’s tenure, districts , and ignored the state’s . Test scores stagnated, and Ybarra  

Ybarra, who took a job as earlier this month, defended her record during the campaign, saying state graduation rates and college and career readiness.

Critchfield, who was sworn into her four-year term Jan. 6, is pledging a new day. 

Idaho has long been a state where the concept of local control of public education is sacrosanct, where parental choice is seen as a top value and where public charter schools have proliferated and thrived.

How does Critchfield envision her new role, and the Idaho Department of Education’s place in the state’s education ecosystem? What lessons can Idaho teach the rest of the country? I recently interviewed Critchfield to get her perspective on these issues. 

The conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

����Ӱ��: What do you plan to change about how the State Department of Education operated under your predecessor?

Debbie Critchfield: Literally everything. The transparency piece is huge. And earning and deserving the respect and trust of our districts and our legislature. We have to reestablish trust around education. There are things that I believe need to happen immediately. The Department of Education is an agency designed to support schools. We need to demonstrate that we do provide that service. I’m looking at standing up some regional support centers around the state so that our folks in the most rural parts of the state and anywhere in the state aren’t dependent upon trying to contact someone in Boise.

What are some of the key issues you want to address early in your term?

I’m a big believer in the science of reading, and I believe that has been pushed to the side, and we in Idaho have not acknowledged sufficiently what it does for kids. You can expect to see that as a main point of conversation when we talk about literacy. Looking at our math scores, we’re no better than most states. I will want to work with our State Board of Education on a major math initiative. I’ve signaled to those folks that that’s a conversation that they can expect.

And then there is the workforce piece. We at the state, as well as local boards and districts, need to be initiating conversations with their community businesses and industries. One of the biggest services that we can do for our students is providing that connection — how what I’m learning in class translates to the outside world. 

I talk to people in schools and districts frequently who are interested in having us help build these types of relationships and programs for their students. They’re not sure how to go about it. Fortunately, there are lots of models out there to draw from.

What made you decide to run for the state superintendent position?

Well, there were two things, actually. First, the COVID experience really highlighted the missed opportunities that Idaho didn’t move on. We had this interesting time in education where everything, all these state and federal laws, rules, requirements, etc. were waived. That created so many opportunities to try new things. But it felt like many of the educational leaders at the state level just kind of held their breath and then it was like, “Oh, OK, COVID’s over, let’s go back to business. Let’s go back to how things were.”

So that’s the first thing that motivated me. A frustration with the lack of vision, the lack of leadership. There was this tremendous opportunity to reimagine and create a system wrapped around what is most valuable for kids. Public education is in many ways still based on an 1850s model. There are some things that still work, and many that don’t. I felt frustration over the missed opportunity.

Second, I also felt frustrated with our lack of progress. We’re moving, but is it forward and is it towards the outcomes and the goals that we have for our kids? What are we preparing our kids to know and be able to do? Having been on the State Board of Education for the past eight years, I had a front row seat. And it became clear to me that I was doing as much as I could as an appointed volunteer. I needed to change roles to really advance some of the things that I heard from communities, parents, students and teachers.

What did you say on the campaign trail that resonated with voters and allowed you to defeat a well-known incumbent?

I would ask people all the time: Can you tell me what the vision is for K-12 education in Idaho? And every group I spoke to, whether it was business leaders, parents, teachers, they’d all look at each other and just shrug. No one knew. I didn’t know. And I’ve been in a position where I should know. No one knew because there was no vision. 

So then I could tell people here’s my plan, my vision. We’ve got to prepare our kids for the jobs and opportunities of a growing state. To me, this means providing a meaningful experience for high school students, and making sure that they’re prepared at the earliest levels. Providing fundamentals of reading and math for our very earliest learners, to make sure that by the time they hit high school, they’re prepared for that next thing, which to me is less about seat time and more about the application of knowledge. I’m a big fan of any type of work-based learning, project-based learning. internships, apprenticeships, particularly for juniors and seniors.

Those seemed like basic, educational, non-political messages, and they resonated.

Idaho has been stagnant or moving backwards for years in what locally is called the go-on rate, the percentage of high school students who go on to some kind of post-secondary opportunity. The rate for the most recent year was just 37%. That might be in part because of the disconnect between schools and workforce experiences. How do you plan to address that?

 I like to reference two numbers together because I believe they tell an interesting story. First of all, the go-on rate is not a perfect measure because it does not capture everything. It misses, for example, military service. But having said that, it is a data point we have to work with, 37%. But at the same time, 80% of graduating high school seniors have taken at least one dual credit class (high school and college credit).

When I look at those numbers side by side, what it tells me is that students want to jumpstart their future. They want the ability to learn from things that are going to benefit them from outside of high school. There are a lot of opportunities that we are not bringing into the schools, that would indicate to a student that there are a lot of ways that you can be prepared for life after school, and to have early access to things that you’re interested in. That may not always look like college.

For the past eight years, the Department of Education has not fulfilled its accountability role. How do you turn that culture around?

It is going to be a process. Over the past few years, local control became this pat answer, and a cover for a lack of leadership. When our districts asked for support with something, they’d often hear, “Oh, sorry, that’s a local control issue.” Local decision-making the way I define it does not mean being left alone. 

I celebrate local decision-making. But how about if I help you look at and have access to all the best information that’s out there? So before you choose curriculum, which is your decision, and I don’t look to change that, why don’t I offer you some information that might help you make a decision? Did you know that there are several factors that you could consider before you decide? Did you know that these other districts are having success with this particular curriculum?

I’ve heard all over the state that districts have really felt left alone, they feel as though they’re in silos and it really has been every man for himself. Again, it’s under that guise of, “Oh, sorry, local control, can’t help you.” I don’t accept that.

What’s your view of the impact charter schools have had on Idaho public education?

I think there are missed opportunities here. What I mean by that is that we have charter schools that are doing incredible things across the state, and these are things that district-run public schools can do as well. But here’s a real disconnect. I hear about this not just from parents, but from people involved in education. “Well, they’re a charter so they get to design their start and stop times and they get to design the projects that they do.” And I tell them: so do you. You get to do that same thing. 

I believe I can do a lot of matchmaking between innovative charters and district schools. But we have to break down some of the misconceptions, that charters aren’t public schools, and they are not held to the same if not higher standards of accountability.

Finally, what makes Idaho a special place that other states might want to look to for ideas and inspiration?

We’re geographically spread out and diverse in our communities in a number of ways. But statewide we’re talking just over 300,000 students. That gives us the ability to really impact and effect change quickly. We don’t have to wait five or 10 years to really see the result of the work that we’re doing. That’s something that I believe makes Idaho unique. We’ve just lacked the leadership to make it happen.

Now, as courts and politicians decide the future of the state’s school voucher program, a study released in December indicates that private school choice hasn’t had the damaging impact that many of its detractors claim. In fact, its author argues, racial segregation of students tended to decline in school districts where more students were eligible to receive vouchers from the state. 

The was commissioned by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a reform-friendly think tank with a special focus on research and advocacy in Ohio. Its arrival could help shape the debate over the effects of school vouchers and the course that the state’s ambitious choice agenda will take in 2023, though voucher critics may contest its findings on school funding.

Alleging that the public funding of private schools is unconstitutional, and that the current system “discriminates against minority students by increasing segregation in Ohio’s public schools,” a coalition of school districts last year. A Columbus judge by the government to dismiss the case just a few weeks after the Fordham report was issued. At the same time, Republican lawmakers to massively expand the voucher program, known locally as EdChoice, to all of Ohio’s K–12 students after stalled in December. 

Roughly 60,000 kids statewide receive EdChoice scholarships ($7,500 for high schoolers, $5,500 for younger children) to defray tuition costs at private schools, including religious institutions. That number over the last decade, leading supporters of public schools to complain that their enrollment, finances, and academic offerings have been harmed by the rapid movement of families and funding from districts.

But study author Stéphane Lavertu, a political scientist at Ohio State University, argued that his research didn’t support those claims. The report shows that vouchers’ effects on student achievement and per-pupil funding in public schools are ambiguous, but not obviously negative — and far from increasing racial segregation in affected schools, he argued, EdChoice seems to actively decrease it.

“What we can say with some level of certainty is that segregation did not go up in district schools,” Lavertu said. “In fact, we can say with some confidence that it went down. That’s the only finding where I would say that there’s a clear direction, and it’s down.”

Lavertu examined school- and district-level figures for 47 Ohio districts where students in at least one school were entitled to scholarships between the 2006–07 and 2018–19 academic years. While eligibility was eventually expanded to students from comparatively low-income families, the study focuses almost exclusively on the original eligibility threshold, which hinged on students attending a school designated by the state as underperforming. 

The availability of vouchers clearly impacted student headcounts: On average, a district with at least one EdChoice-eligible school experienced a decline of between 10 and 15 percent of its students over a little more than a decade. 

But those exits were disproportionately driven by non-white students, Lavertu found. Data from the Ohio Department of Education revealed that 56 percent of participants in EdChoice during the period under study were African American, Hispanic, American Indian, or Alaskan Native. Consequently, the average district that was exposed to EdChoice saw a 13 percent decline in its percentage of minority students; those departing students left for private schools with higher concentrations of white and Asian students, while the district schools they left became less racially isolated (falling from roughly 57 percent minority-enrolled to roughly 50 percent). 

Happily, academic outcomes also improved somewhat. Using Ohio’s “district performance index,” a composite measure that includes the proficiency levels of students in all tested subjects and grades, Lavertu found that achievement climbed in the typical district with EdChoice-eligible schools. Those gains were reached from a startlingly low baseline, with average academic performance rising from the second percentile statewide (roughly the twelfth-lowest-performing district in Ohio) to the sixth percentile (roughly the 37th-lowest-performing district). 

Those findings were far less definitive than those for segregation, the study notes, because it can’t be known why the index ticked upward. The impetus might be improved teaching in public schools as a product of private school competition, but it could also stem from relatively lower-performing students being more likely to receive vouchers, changing the composition of the existing school system.

While the academic results were “very noisy,” Lavertu said, the results make it hard to claim that the remaining public school students are worse-off academically than they would have been if vouchers didn’t exist.

Funding questions

The study’s most disputed assertions relate to the financial consequences of EdChoice, which are central to the arguments of its opponents. 

Because voucher funding originates with the state, school districts only lose that portion of K–12 revenue when their students leave for private schools (according to , 42 percent of Ohio’s total K–12 spending came from the state in Fiscal Year 2020, though the percentage allocated from Columbus to each district is determined through a complex formula). Local dollars, which are principally collected through property taxes, are not affected.

Once some families use their vouchers, that money is also spread over fewer public school students. In fact, per-pupil expenditures rose by 1.39 percent in districts exposed to EdChoice; operating expenditures (i.e., those unrelated to capital spending on things like land, buildings, and equipment) rose by 4.55 percent per-pupil. While those results aren’t big enough to be considered statistically significant, Lavertu argues in the study, they can effectively rule out the notion that tax-funded scholarships lead to declining spending on public school students.

Even if those calculations are accurate, however, voucher critics say that they ignore a disquieting reality: Some localities find themselves needing to raise their own property taxes in order to cover costs when students and state funding are gone. Their efforts to do so often fall short — the people of Parma, the state’s seventh-largest city, that were brought to the ballot — and even when they succeed, cash-strapped towns and cities are left reaching deeper into their own pockets to fund essential services.

Thomas Sutton, a professor of political science at the private Baldwin Wallace University, pointed to that has occurred since 2019, when the Ohio legislature lifted income thresholds for families to become eligible. Some districts have been left asking their residents to pay more for the same schools, often while attempting to cut costs by closing or consolidating buildings that cost the same to maintain no matter how many students are enrolled. 

“The amount of money those districts are using per-pupil hasn’t declined precipitously,” Sutton said. “But the reason it hasn’t declined is because they’ve had to make it up through local taxation, not because there’s been no impact on the local district.” Meanwhile, state spending on private schools .

Lavertu acknowledged that the immediate effects of losing students to programs like EdChoice could be “difficult to deal with.” But he added that the influence of school choice could still be neutral, or even beneficial, over time — particularly when combined with necessary reforms to adjust for shrinking enrollment.

“When you’re losing students and losing revenue, but those fixed costs are there, you’ve got to make some really hard choices going forward. In the short term, that can be really, really painful,” he observed. “What I’d say with the funding is that, in the long run, it doesn’t appear to have a negative financial impact.”

The fiscal challenges facing Ohio’s schools could grow even more tangled with of HB 126, legislation that limits public challenges of property tax valuations. In recent decades, school districts have clawed back significant amounts of annual revenue by appealing to county boards when they believed that nearby properties — the — were undervalued. Under the new law, the avenues to such challenges are sharply curtailed. Local authorities have also struggled to that allow millions of dollars of tax revenue to go uncollected.

Matthew Chingos, vice president for education data and policy for the Urban Institute, has conducted several reviews of the effects of private school choice on phenomena . Much of the existing research, he noted, looked at small-bore programs that were intended only for poor children or those with disabilities. But with more and more states attempting to rapidly scale their voucher initiatives — Ohio could be next if Republican lawmakers are successful — there could be a need for “a new generation of evidence” to shed light on how a more muscular approach to choice helps or hurts traditional public school systems.

“[Scaling up] increases the potential for these programs to make a difference for the better, but it also raises the risk that, if they have negative effects, they’ll be more widely felt,” Chingos said.

As Democrats argue Gov. Kim Reynolds’ private school scholarship program would take away funding from Iowa’s public schools, Republicans are pointing to the governor’s proposed budget as proof that support for Iowa’s K-12 system remains strong.

Reynolds is proposing a budget of nearly $8.5 billion for the upcoming fiscal year, an increase over the current year of roughly $300 million. More than half of the state spending proposed is for education.

Over the next four years, the education savings account (ESA) program would cost $918 million, according to estimates by the governor’s office. Democrats and public school advocates say that is nearly $1 billion in state funds being diverted from public schools, but Republicans argue that it is new, unrelated spending.

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In the same four year period, the state is estimated to spend $15.2 billion on public education, with expectations of increasing K-12 spending by roughly 2.5% each year. But Democrats said that Iowa has underfunded education for years, and that the money put toward the governor’s plan should go toward filling funding gaps in public schools.

Margaret Buckton, a lobbyist with the Urban Education Network and the Rural School Advocates of Iowa, told legislators Wednesday that Iowa’s education spending has lagged inflation for both per-pupil costs and the cost of “doing the business of school” in the past decade.

“Our major concern is a program like this, that phases in over four years with hundreds of millions of dollars of obligation on part of the state, that hits the balance sheet exactly when the historic tax cuts of last year reduce state revenues by 1.8 billion, means that our school districts are concerned there will never be increases in the state cost per-pupil adequate to provide the programs that our students in public schools need,” Buckton said.

Grassley said no matter how much money the Legislature designates for state supplemental aid to public schools, Democrats will always say its not enough.

“That’s a consistent argument that we’ve always faced,” Grassley said. “We’re spending more money on public education now than we ever have in the history of this state. … Clearly we’ve made it a priority as part of our budgets, I don’t see (ESAs) being one of those things that is a drain on that.”

Other priorities for 2023

While her private school scholarship program is a central focus this year, Reynolds has also announced plans to restructure Iowa’s system of government agencies and departments as well as enacting policies she said will help rural health care systems, from funding obstetrics fellowships to tort reform.

Here are some takeaways in the governor’s proposed budget for fiscal 2024, which begins July 1, 2023:

Overall spending: Reynolds is recommending Iowa increase its net spending from an estimated $8.2 billion in 2023 to nearly $8.5 billion in FY 2024. That 3.3% growth is greater than the previous year’s estimated growth of less than 1%. The rise was higher than in previous years because of increased federal aid disbursements, but the state government will still leave nearly $2 billion unspent from Iowa’s general fund budget.

Property taxes: A notable omission from Reynolds’ Condition of the State address and proposed budget was changes to Iowa’s property tax code, which legislative Republicans have highlighted as their tax policy focus in 2023. Replacements for property tax revenue were not included in Reynolds’ budget proposal this year, but Grassley said tax policy changes are typically one of the areas that take the most time for the Legislature to work through.

“I hope we didn’t build a false expectation of tax policy that it’s done immediately in every session that we did last year,” Grassley said. “… I think you’re gonna see us hopefully fund some bills sooner than later as well, that are going to begin that conversation around property tax.”

Reynolds did say she hopes to improve the “affordability of child care through property tax parity” for both commercial and in-home care providers, but did not mention other potential property tax reforms.

Education: More than half, 56.4%, of Reynolds’ proposed budget is appropriated to education.

Private school scholarships: The private school scholarship proposal Reynolds laid out as her top priority for this year’s session is built into her budget. She has allocated $106.9 million for the education savings accounts, or ESA, program, in its first year. The governor’s office calculated that amount using data on how many Iowa kindergarteners are enrolled in private schools and how many current private school students are under 300% of the federal poverty line. The governor’s office based its estimate on the assumption that about 1% of public school students in grades 1-12 are likely to transfer.

State aid:  The budget overall includes a 2.5% increase in funding for K-12 public schools. That includes an $82 million increase for the State Foundation School Aid and over $700,000 more for the transportation equity fund, but no other changes in PK-12 spending from the current fiscal year.

Higher education: The Iowa Board of Regents asked the Legislature to for the state’s three public universities, but Reynolds’ proposal would allocate less than half that amount, granting a $12.5 million increase. That’s more than the Regents received in previous years, but board members said they this year to both keep up with inflation and make up for underfunding in previous appropriations cycles.

Agency consolidation: The governor also said she plans to take on a major internal project for Iowa’s government: restructuring the state’s system of agencies, with a planned consolidation from 37 to 16 cabinet-level departments. While she said this would not result in loss of funding or services, she said the government would save money through combining offices, selling land and cutting full-time equivalent positions that are currently vacant. The governor’s office estimates its reorganization will save Iowa more than $214 million in the course of four years, with an estimated $73.5 million in savings in  year one.

Rural health care: As the state continues to struggle with workforce shortages, Reynolds proposed expanding Iowa’s existing apprenticeship programs for in-demand fields that require training. A large focus was on the state’s Iowa Health Careers Registered Apprenticeship Program, which said will expand to cover more nursing programs, EMR, EMT, and paramedic and direct care professional certification, as well as behavioral health training. This expansion would be met with an increase in funding from $3 million to $15 million, the governor proposed.

Iowa also faces a shortage of OB-GYN health care providers specifically. The governor announced her plans to use $560,000 to fund four obstetrics fellowships for family medicine physicians, who would be required to commit to practicing in rural and underserved communities for five years following the fellowship.

Additionally, Reynolds called for the creation of two new regional “Centers of Excellence,” health care providers in rural Iowa that provide specialized services from cancer treatment, maternal health programs and surgery. Her budget would provide $575,000 to fund the new centers.

Abortion alternatives: While Reynolds and Republican leadership have said they plan to hold off on further abortion legislation until the Iowa Supreme Court makes a decision in the state’s law banning the procedure after six weeks, Reynolds did say she plans to increase funding available for abortion alternative organizations this year. Reynolds called for growing the “More Options for Maternal Support,” or MOMS program funding from $500,000 to $2 million.

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Iowa Capital Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kathie Obradovich for questions: info@iowacapitaldispatch.com. Follow Iowa Capital Dispatch on and .

These findings, released last week in a of 3,820 U.S. parents of school-aged children by the National School Choice Awareness Foundation, paint a vivid portrait of a population that is eager for new education options, willing to consider innovative alternatives and hungry for information.

High parent satisfaction while searching for something different isn’t as paradoxical as it might sound. American families want not just a good education for their children, but a great one. Sometimes that means finding a better fit that’s specific to their unique student, even if he or she already attends a strong school.

According to the survey, interest in considering new schools is highest among key demographic groups that make up a growing share of the K-12 parent population: Black, Hispanic and young millennial parents between the ages of 18 and 29. Nearly two thirds of Black (64.5%), Hispanic (64.6%) and young millennial (63.3%) parents considered new schools for their children last year.

More than a third of parents in each of these demographic groups also said they participated in out-of-school learning projects with other families, including microschools or pods. All of this rings true to my millennial ears. Call millennials disruptors (or high-maintenance), but my generation is loath to accept things as given or immutable. I have a theory that this perspective on education in particular comes from having grown up in a time of greater school choice than ever before. Since the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program passed in 1990, and the first public charter school opened its doors in Minnesota in 1992, my generation of students has grown up in a market of broad education options.

Having school choice is an expectation in many communities, and it continues to expand across the country. When parents face a lack of choices in their communities, they create their own. They want diverse education options that reflect their communities and address the specific needs of their children. But as today’s parents consider the best learning options for their children, they also have specific needs that education leaders and decisionmakers must work to meet.

First, nearly half of parents (48%) in the survey said their community does not offer enough schooling choices for families — and transportation is a key issue. One third of parents who did not seek out new schools said they would be likely to consider making a switch if transportation were provided. Officials must listen to these families and take their concerns seriously.

Second, there’s more work to be done to meet the growing demand for information about education. Nearly two thirds of parents –– including 75.3% of young millennials, 71.2% of Black parents and 75.7% of Latinos –– said they would benefit from knowing more about the choices available for their children’s education. As the available types of schools in states and in local communities change over time, education leaders have a duty to communicate with parents in jargon-free, practical and proactive ways so they choose well for their children.

Addressing this second challenge is at the core of my work at the foundation. It’s why the foundation, in partnership with tens of thousands of schools, works to inform and inspire parents each January during National School Choice Week. And year-round, we provide school navigation resources such as articles, videos and social media Q&A’s in English and in Spanish via the School Choice Week and Conoce tus Opciones Escolares brands.

Education leaders and decisionmakers must recognize that all students are unique and support them in their formative K-12 years with responsive, robust education options. It’s no less than they deserve, and no more than what America’s parents expect.