Providing Educational Opportunity Is the New Hampshire Way
Dec 19, 2017
Providing
Educational Opportunity Is the New Hampshire Way
Education savings accounts
are the next stage in New Hampshire’s tradition of providing public funding for
educational opportunities.
Concord,
N.H.—The Granite Institute today released two new reports to help policymakers,
community leaders and education advocates understand K-12 education savings
accounts or ESAs.
The
first report explores New Hampshire’s history of providing public funding for
children to learn at private schools, and the second report explains how ESAs
work in other states. Click here to
download the reports.
Granite
State lawmakers currently are debating SB 193, which would create K-12
education savings accounts that would empower families to choose the learning
environment best suited for their child. These reports provide necessary
context for that debate.
Public Funds for Private Schooling in New
Hampshire: Myths and Facts
New
Hampshire has a long history of providing public financial support to families
enrolling their children in private schools, including for-profit and religious
schools, a report released today by the Granite Institute shows. In fact, towns
have been contracting with private schools to educate the children of residents
at least as far back as 1792.
“Prominent
policymakers are often unaware that it is a regular and longstanding practice
of many Granite State towns to use public dollars to support children enrolled
in private school,” Granite Institute CEO J. Scott Moody said. The author of
the article, Granite Institute Education Fellow Dr. Jody Underwood adds, “Some
of these policymakers make statements that are just not true. We can only have
a productive conversation about how tax dollars should be spent once we know
what really happens, and how, and why.”
The
report, “Public Funds for Private Schooling in New Hampshire: Myths and Facts” provides
examples and
supporting legislation about how the three northern New England states and
their local governments have historically used tax dollars to pay for schooling
and related services from private institutions – including religious schools,
for-profit organizations, and even schools in other states.
Meaningful and productive discussions about
education funding must take into account existing realities. Although some
state officials have recently claimed that public funds cannot support children
enrolled in private schools, the reality is that New Hampshire tax dollars long
supported students attending private schools, including religious schools and
for-profit institutions.
Education Savings Accounts: A Primer
In conjunction with EdChoice, a national
nonprofit working to advance educational opportunity for all children, the
Granite Institute has released a primer on education savings accounts (ESAs), including
how they work and how other states have implemented them.
ESAs allow families to receive a deposit of
public funds into government-authorized savings accounts with restricted, but
multiple, uses. That means families are no longer limited to a choice among
schools; they can fully customize their children’s education.
With an ESA, families receive restricted-use
“debit cards” loaded with a portion of their children’s share of per-pupil
funds, or access the funds via an online portal. They can then direct those
funds to pay for pre- approved educational services and providers, including
private school tuition, tutoring, textbooks, curricula, online learning,
educational therapy, individual public school classes, Advanced Placement
courses, and transportation to and from an education service provider. Families
can roll over unused funds from year to year and even deposit funds into a
college savings account.
Six
states currently have ESAs, including Arizona, Florida, Mississippi, North
Carolina, Tennessee and Nevada. New Hampshire’s SB 193 most closely resembles
the ESAs in Arizona and Nevada, where lawmakers enacted ESA programs that are
open to all students switching out of a public school or, in the case of
Arizona, students who are entering kindergarten or first grade. The remaining four
the ESA programs exclusively serve students with special needs. Although they
differ in terms of eligibility, funding, and administration, all the programs
empower families with greater freedom and flexibility to customize their
child’s education to meet his or her individual learning needs.
Formed in 2011, the Granite
Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and educational organization
based in Concord.
For more information, visit GraniteInstitute.com. To schedule an interview, contact Jody Underwood at 215-801-2823 or junderwood@graniteinstitute.org.
About The Author
J. Scott Moody

J. Scott Moody has worked as a Public Policy Economist for over 18 years. He is the author, co-author and editor of 180 studies and books.
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