Education Funding Report Roundup

School Choice

By Arianna Prothero — October 09, 2018 1 min read
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More states are using tax breaks to incentivize donations to private school scholarship programs, finds a new Government Accountability Office report.

Tax-credit scholarships are the lesser-known cousins of school vouchers and are also a favored policy of U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos. The GAO examined 22 tax-credit scholarship programs in 18 states. All told, these programs awarded more than $856 million during the 2016-17 school year, the most recent year for which data were available.

It found 17 programs have income limits for participating families, ranging from $32,000 to $136,500 per year for a four-person household. In six of the 17 programs, the income limits exceeded their state’s median income.

A version of this article appeared in the October 10, 2018 edition of Education Week as School Choice

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