School Choice: More Than One Way Forward for Families and Students in 2024

By Hohna Hartley

You might expect a worldwide pandemic to spur a public outcry for better healthcare or cause a shake-up in the next election. What you might not expect is a significantly greater demand for more school choice; but that’s exactly the trend in the United States, post-pandemic.

Though the school choice movement as we know it has been growing for the past 30 years, parents’ expressed desire for the best school option for their children has ramped up considerably since 2020. During the pandemic, many schools were either shut down completely or children were at home attending school online. As a result, parents were forced to take a more active role in their children’s education. Since then, more parents have chosen to pursue a variety of educational alternatives.

The call for increased school choice has been heard by state legislators, and in 2023, 17 states made changes to law or policy to expand school choice options for their families and students. Examples of school choice expansion include the following:

• Education savings accounts (ESAs), which enable families to use state funds for education and related expenses,
• Homeschool, through which students have increased access to ESAs and more opportunity to mix and match their education with part-time public or online learning programs.
• School vouchers, which give parents the choice of private schools for their children
• Tax-credit scholarships (see section below on Children’s Tuition Fund)
• Individual tax-credits and deductions, which allow parents to “receive state income tax relief for approved educational expenses”

A quick tour around the country provides a glimpse of where school choice policies are taking root and growing. In Montana, for instance, two notable new charter school laws were passed in 2023, and in that same state students were granted increased access to online learning.

Greater acceptance of ESAs across the country means increased benefits and options for students in public, charter, private, and homeschool settings. West Virginia offers the Hope Scholarship, for which 90% of West Virginia students are eligible. Tennessee offers an Individualized Education Account and has developed a pilot ESA program for some low- and middle-income students. Arizona offers the Empowerment Scholarship Account, which is available to all students and is presented on the Arizona Department of Education website with this introduction: “Parents have the right to choose what’s best for their family and have their education tax dollars pay for the school that meets their child’s needs.”

Those words should be music to the ears of any parental choice advocate whose efforts are paving the path to increased educational options around the country. ACSI is working tirelessly with Christian schools and their leaders to provide support, advocacy, and communication between Christian school leaders and their legislators. In a recent interview, George Tryfiates, vice president of Public Policy and Legal Affairs at ACSI, explained that there are currently more than 65 school choice programs in 31 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, that allow private school participation and that it is ACSI’s goal to strengthen and expand those programs—with your help.

For example, Tryfiates reports that federal legislators have allowed 529 savings accounts to be used for K-12 education in addition to college. This is a step forward for families who wish to use their educational savings for a different schooling option while their children are high school-age and younger. Christian school leaders can help in spreading this valuable information to families in their communities.

In addition, the Educational Choice for Children Act is a school choice bill that ACSI has been supporting in Congress, and which will be a focus again in the 2024 legislative season. ACSI is working hard to make sure legislators know that families want and need greater school choice options, and your school can make a difference, too. Your part can be as simple as staying informed and reaching out to the legislators in your state in support of critical bills like this one.

At the state level, families in Illinois recently lost a tax credit scholarship program, despite ACSI’s efforts to keep it in place. This means that 10,000 low-to middle-income students in Illinois will lose their scholarships and may have to return to the public schools they chose to leave.

ACSI has moved beyond words to action by creating a multi-state tax credit scholarship fund, known as the Children’s Tuition Fund (CTF), a program that incentivizes scholarship donations by allowing those donations to receive a tax credit. CTF operates tax credit scholarships in seven states. For example, in Viriginia, Alabama, a donor will receive a 100% tax credit; a $1,000 donation can result in a $1,000 tax credit. CTF scholarships are given to Christian schools so that they can in turn offer them to low-income children who wish to attend their school. It’s an opportunity to change students’ lives, and a clear example of why advocacy is needed at the federal and state level.

Tryfiates explained that school choice opportunities are moving in an exciting direction in states like Oklahoma, Texas, Florida, Idaho, and West Virginia. He shared, “When you think about the 31 states that have programs … the battle now is to improve the ones that are in place and then as well to expand to new places.”

ACSI’s Public Policy & Legal Affairs team exists to partner with schools like yours and with legislators to work for positive policies in support of Christian education and school choice. January 21-27, 2024, is School Choice Week, and with legislatures coming back into session at the start of the year, there are many opportunities to support the cause of school choice and Christian education.

Tryfiates invites schools to partner with ACSI in the school choice cause. “Even if you have a school choice program in your state, I would encourage our Christian schools to engage in the policy process to help make those programs better or to create programs that don’t exist,” urged Tryfiates. “And, of course, ACSI is here to help you be able to do that.”

How Can You Make a Difference in the Lives of Students in Your State & Across the Country?

• Pray!
• Reach out to the Public Policy & Advocacy Team at ACSI for updates on issues and ways to be involved at the federal and state levels
• Communicate school choice needs and opportunities to the families in your school community and to your state and federal legislators
• Join ACSI at our Public Policy & Advocacy Summit, Sept. 16-18, 2024, to glean best practices and learn how to advocate on the Hill

For more information about school choice, go to the School Choice FAQs – EdChoice and National School Choice Week websites.