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Hope Scholarship

Education ChoiceFeaturedHope ScholarshipParental ChoicePrivate School ScholarshipsSchool ChoiceSpotlightsStudent spotlight

The light at the end of the tunnel was a Hope Scholarship

Ron Matus December 15, 2020
Ron Matus

Parker Hyndman, who attends Montessori by the Sea in St. Pete Beach, Florida, is described by the assistant to the head of school as “an old soul” with “a big heart” who clicked immediately with teachers and classmates at the private school he attends on a Hope Scholarship. PHOTO: Lance Rothstein

Editor’s note: To hear Tamara Arrington and her son, Parker, tell the story in their own words, watch the video at the end of this post.

The other student was older and bigger. But Parker, a 35-pound “runt” of a first grader, as his mom described him, didn’t hesitate. When the other student called his friend a racial slur on the bus, Parker piped up: “Don’t call her that.”

Parker felt proud for sticking up for his friend. But daring to do so tripped off a chain of events that would plunge him and his mom, Tamara Arrington, into a year-long nightmare. Some of the other kids put Parker in their sights. When Arrington asked them to stop, one of their parents called police. Eventually, Arrington sought relief in court.

“It was a very dark tunnel for us,” said Arrington, a personal chef and published author. “I had no way to protect my son. I had no way to make sure that my son was getting the education that he needed.”

Hope arrived unexpectedly when Arrington stumbled on to the existence of the Hope Scholarship, an education choice scholarship that Florida lawmakers created in 2018 for students like Parker. Having that option, she said, changed everything. 

“Our light came in the form of a Hope Scholarship,” she said.

Parker Hyndman. PHOTO: Lance Rothstein

Arrington and her son moved to the Suncoast six years ago. For more than a year, the school she handpicked, an A-rated elementary near some of America’s sweetest beaches, couldn’t have been more perfect. Parker excelled socially and academically. Arrington joined the PTA.

When Parker got to first grade, he wanted to ride the bus. Arrington said okay, thinking it would boost his independence. But after Parker stood up to the other kid, things went south.

A group of students on the bus started making fun of his name. (Parker’s last name is Hyndman, so they called him variations on “Hiney.”) They made of fun of his teeth. (Some of his baby teeth were discolored after a tumble down some stairs.) They threw paper balls and candy wrappers at him.

Nearly every day, it was something. Arrington said she went to school officials repeatedly, and was assured repeatedly things would get better. But they didn’t get better – and Parker went from loving school to “despising it.”

“I no longer had that smiling little kid that got off the bus and was happy to see me,” Arrington said. “I had a child in tears, in a rage, just so upset that sometimes he … couldn’t even form words to tell me or any of the other mothers at the bus stop what had happened.”

Arrington felt she had no choice but to take matters into her own hands, but the conflict escalated in ways she never would have imagined. One time, she told one of the students, while at the bus stop with other parents, to please stop picking on her son. That night she got a call from police, who said they got a call from the student’s parent. Another time, she did the same thing – only to have police show up at the bus stop. Arrington now had to respond to allegations that she was the bully.

Meanwhile, Parker started getting frequent headaches and stomach aches. At one point, Arrington took him to the emergency room. The doctors couldn’t find anything physically wrong. They asked, “Is Parker under a lot of stress?”

In late 2018, the stress boiled over. At a community event, there was an incident involving Parker and one of his friends and one of the same students on the bus. Afterwards, Arrington went to court and was granted a temporary restraining order. Two weeks later, a judge extended it three months, and urged the other parent to “get professional help” for the other child.

At school, things still weren’t right. Arrington said the school was upset because now it had to make special accommodations to keep the students separated. There was still too much tension.

She started thinking more about a potential solution she learned about a few months prior. She said she was Googling bullying prevention when an article about the Hope Scholarship popped up. Arrington thought it was too good to be true. But in the spring of 2019, she applied.

She and Parker were at the beach at sunset when she saw the email from Step Up For Students saying he had been awarded. Moments later, Parker said, a pod of dolphins started leaping out of the water.

“Definitely a sign,” he said.

“I just felt this wave of relief coming off of me,” Arrington said.

Parker Hyndman and his mother, Tamara Arrington. PHOTO: Lance Rothstein

Arrington began checking out other schools. She wanted a place where Parker could find peace. A friend suggested Montessori by the Sea, overlooking the sand dunes and sea oats in St. Pete Beach. Parker sat in on classes for two days – including yoga on the beach – and loved it.

“When I was at the other school, I felt like okay, I’m going into the worst day in my life repeatedly,” said Parker, now a fourth grader. “But here, I’m excited to get out of bed to come to the beach at my own school. And I’m excited to learn about fun stuff. Definitely.”

Christina Warnstedt, the assistant to the head of school, said Arrington told them about the trauma Parker had endured. But there was never any trepidation about enrolling him. “It was more like, ‘This could be the answer for him,’ ” she said.

And it was. Warnstedt described Parker as “an old soul” with “a big heart” who clicked immediately with teachers and classmates. He became a comforter to another student who was experiencing emotional challenges. “He’s just a light,” she said.

Arrington called the school a hidden gem “tucked away in this little bubble of happiness.”

“I have no doubt that every morning when I drop off my son at school,” she said, “he’s going to come home a better human being.”

Arrington said she’s not sure what would have happened had the scholarship not made that possible.

“There’s no better word than to say that it gave Parker hope for his future. And it gave me hope,” she said. “Making sure that as a mother, that I was making the right decisions for my son. And that he would thrive. Thrive in school. Thrive in life. Thrive. That’s what I wanted. So, the Hope Scholarship truly gave us hope.”

 

December 15, 2020 1 comment
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Education ChoiceEducation EquityFamily Empowerment ScholarshipFeaturedFlorida Tax Credit ScholarshipGardiner ScholarshipHope ScholarshipNewsParental ChoicePrivate School ScholarshipsReading ScholarshipSchool ChoiceTax Credit Scholarships

Step Up For Students ranks 21st on Forbes’ list of top charities

Patrick R. Gibbons December 11, 2020
Patrick R. Gibbons

All students at each of three Academy Prep campuses — St. Petersburg, Tampa and Lakeland, Florida — attend on state scholarships administered by Step Up For Students.

Americans donated more than $450 billion to charities last year. Of that amount, $49.5 billion went to the top 100 charities, according to Forbes Magazine’s America’s Top Charities rankings.

Step Up for Students, a scholarship granting nonprofit that administers five school choice scholarship programs in Florida, ranked as the 21st largest nonprofit in America. Step Up, which raised $618 million in private donations last year and hosts this blog.

Step Up’s scholarship programs include the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for lower-income and working-class students, the Gardiner Scholarship for students with unique abilities, the Hope Scholarship for victims of bullying and harassment, the Reading Scholarship for public school students struggling with reading and literacy, and the Family Empowerment Scholarship for lower- and middle-class students.

Step Up’s goal for the fiscal year 2021 is to raise $700 million to fund the Florida Tax Credit and Hope Scholarship programs. The Gardiner Scholarship, Reading Scholarship and Family Empowerment Scholarship programs are funded by the Florida legislature, though Step Up advertises these scholarships, processes applications and helps manage accounts for Gardiner and Reading scholarship families.

Since offering the first scholarships during the 2002-03 school year, Step Up has awarded scholarships to more than 1 million students. The organization served more than 150,000 students during the 2020-21 school year.

December 11, 2020 0 comment
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Commentary and OpinionDemographic ResearchEducation and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceEducation LegislationFeaturedHope ScholarshipParent EmpowermentParental ChoiceSchool Choice

Manhattan Institute releases report on Florida Hope Scholarship Program

Matthew Ladner November 25, 2020
Matthew Ladner

Manhattan Institute senior fellow Max Eden recently authored a report on the legislative origins and history of the first education choice program for students who have experienced bullying in public schools.

In the report, Eden wrote:

“Education reformers have long lamented America’s persistent racial and socioeconomic achievement gap and framed school choice as a means to provide low-income students of color trapped in failing schools with a ticket to a better education. Yet when parents who participate in school choice programs in states like Georgia or Indiana have been surveyed, at least half of them cite safety as a primary motivating factor.”

Eden familiarized himself with the subject of bullying in Florida public schools when he co-authored the book Why Meadow Died about the Parkland, Florida, school shooting. Why Meadow Died lays out a methodical case regarding the dozens of times a disturbed and violent public school student has been mishandled by school and police authorities before finally going on a murder spree.

In this new report, Eden more happily profiles a program designed to allow the victims of bullying to escape from their tormentors. He writes:

“The Speaker’s office noticed that they were receiving e-mails from parents who were upset at the school’s inability to protect their kids. Parents were saying, ‘This has been happening for years, and they do nothing. They just, at most, give the kid a detention or an in-school suspension and say, ‘That’s the most we can do.’

“Corcoran and his staff reviewed data from Florida’s School Environmental Safety Incident Reporting (SESIR) system, which showed 47,000 incidents in the latest reported year (2015–16) — a figure they felt certain represented only a small fraction of the total. They estimated that there could be as many as 100,000 victims of bullying and abuse. ‘We started brainstorming,’ Ochs says. ‘What could we do? There were already policies in place to address bullying. Maybe we could increase the penalties based on the number and type of an incident? Then a lightbulb just kind of went on for us: this fits with the school choice paradigm. We need to empower parents. They just want their kids protected, and that’s not always happening, so we need to give them the power to force the school’s hand or just get their kid to a safer environment.’ ”

The report quotes several families whose lives have been transformed by the program. One parent described their child as having previously been through “daily torture” while another described a public school whose discipline was so ineffective that that the family sought and received a restraining order from a judge.

In Year 2 of existence, the Hope Scholarship remains a small program. A lack of public awareness and a seeming unwillingness on the part of school district officials to follow the law seem to be contributing factors.

A spring 2020 survey of participating parents by Florida State University’s Learning Systems Institute found that about 70% of respondents learned of the Hope Scholarship on their own or from a third party, not from the school district that had a legal obligation to inform them of it. Some parents reported resistance from public school officials. According to one parent, “The school seemed very hesitant to give me the form. I had to go to the office and basically demand it and make them sign it.”

Another group of parents indicated that the school had refused to acknowledge that bullying had occurred. One parent indicated “the Hope notification form was a challenge because the principal and dean at [school name redacted] refused to acknowledge that the bullying was taking place. They refused to communicate with me in a timely manner. I had to make threats to go to the school board commissioner to get them to respond to the bullying issues.”

While Florida’s bullied children have access to a variety of education choice programs beyond the Hope Scholarship, the Florida Legislature should make this program more accessible. Expecting district school principals to investigate and acknowledge in writing that bullying may be occurring in their schools is unrealistic and is an obstacle that few families are able to overcome.

A program for bullied children would be substantially more useful if it were not so easily thwarted.

November 25, 2020 0 comment
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Education and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceFeaturedHope ScholarshipNewsParental ChoicePrivate School ScholarshipsSchool Choice

Florida Board of Education adjusts rules for Hope Scholarship for bullied students

Lisa Buie July 15, 2020
Lisa Buie

Beginning this school year, Florida public school districts will be required to report to the Florida Department of Education how many families they have informed of the availability of a scholarship for victims of bullying.

The Florida Board of Education approved the changes earlier today as part of its consent agenda, typically reserved for non-controversial items. The measure is included in rule changes that govern the Hope Scholarship.

Prior to the rule change, school districts were required to inform parents about the Hope Scholarship within 15 days after a bullying incident was reported and provide the parent with a completed Hope notification form verifying that the incident was reported. The form was needed to start the scholarship application process.

But 71 percent of Hope parents surveyed by the Learning Systems Institute at Florida State University said they learned of the scholarship through other means, such as private schools, internet searches and social media. Two-thirds disagreed or strongly disagreed that the incidents were investigated in a timely manner, and many expressed frustration with district officials who they said didn’t know the legal requirements or didn’t appear to want to follow them.

Former Florida House Speaker and now Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran spearheaded creation of the Hope Scholarship in 2018. Students are eligible if they report being victims of bullying or similar incidents, including assault, battery, hazing, harassment and sexual misconduct. They can use the scholarship to attend private schools or to transfer to another public school.

At present, 429 students are using a Hope Scholarship, the first of its kind in the United States, at private schools, even though tens of thousands fall into the eligibility categories. State officials projected in 2018 that as many as 7,000 students would use the scholarship, worth about $7,000, annually.

Hope Scholarships are funded by individuals who contribute up to $105 in return for sales tax credits on motor vehicle purchases. So far this year, $60.8 million has been contributed. By law, unused Hope funds can be used for the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for lower-income students.

Both scholarships are administered by Step Up For Students, the nonprofit that hosts this blog.

July 15, 2020 0 comment
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Education and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceFeaturedHope ScholarshipNewsParent EmpowermentSchool Choice

Group urges stronger rules for scholarships to assist bullied students

Lisa Buie June 19, 2020
Lisa Buie

A conservative education group wants state education officials to penalize public school districts that fail to inform parents about the availability of a state scholarship for bullying victims.

Two members of Florida Citizens Alliance told Florida Board of Education members earlier today that rules governing the Hope Scholarship need to be tightened to ensure that districts inform parents they can apply for the scholarship when they report bullying.

“I think there needs to be some teeth in it,” said Keith Flaugh, a managing director of the Naples-based group during a workshop held via conference call to discuss the proposed changes. “The schools are … in many cases, hiding it because they lose funding if a parent takes advantage of it.”

Flaugh added that the state should audit school districts to ensure compliance and levy some type of punishment to those who disregard the rules.

At present, 429 Florida students are using a Hope Scholarship, the first of its kind in America, even though tens of thousands fall into the eligibility categories. State officials projected in 2018 that as many as 7,000 a year would the scholarship, which is worth about $7,000 a year.

To date, the best available evidence suggests a leading reason for the gap is that districts are not telling parents they have this option.

Seventy-one percent of Hope parents surveyed by the Learning Systems Institute at Florida State University said they learned of the scholarship through other avenues, such as private schools, internet searches and social media. Two-thirds disagreed or strongly disagreed that the bullying incidents they reported were investigated in a timely manner, and many expressed frustration with district officials who they said didn’t know the legal requirements.

The survey results prompted the Florida Department of Education to consider rule changes that would require that districts routinely tell the state how many Hope notification forms they have made available to parents.

Currently, there is no such requirement, even though districts are required by law to notify parents about the Hope Scholarship within 15 days of a reported bullying incident and to provide them the Hope form they need to start the application process.

(The scholarship is administered by Step Up For Students, the nonprofit that hosts this blog.)

Rick Stevens, also a managing director of the Florida Citizens Alliance, stressed the need at today’s workshop for follow up to make sure that parents who receive the forms from the districts know how to take advantage of the scholarship opportunity.

“We need to have a way to support the parent, and I’m not sure assuming the districts will provide that is the right approach,” Stevens said, adding that he’s heard reports of parents who had trouble making the connection between receiving the paperwork and applying for the scholarship.

“There needs to be a way to coach them through the process,” he said.

Lawmakers created the Hope Scholarship in 2018, in an effort led by then House Speaker and now Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran. Students are eligible if they report being victims of bullying or similar incidents, including assault, battery, hazing, harassment, and sexual misconduct. They can use the scholarship to attend private schools or to transfer to another public school.

Hope Scholarships are funded by individuals who contribute up to $105 in return for sales tax credits on motor vehicle purchases. So far this year, citizens have contributed $60.8 million. By law, unused Hope funds can be used for the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for lower-income students.

Laura Mazyck, deputy executive director of independent education and parental choice for the Florida Department of Education, told Flaugh and Stevens that their comments would be taken into consideration.

The rule changes are expected to be discussed at the next state Board of Education meeting July 15.

June 19, 2020 0 comment
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Education and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceFeaturedHope ScholarshipNewsParent EmpowermentSchool Choice

School choice scholarship for bullying victims may get boost with reporting changes

Ron Matus June 11, 2020
Ron Matus

Florida education officials are considering changes that could lead to wider use of a school choice scholarship for bullying victims that has so far seen few takers despite tens of thousands of qualifying incidents each year.

The proposed rule changes to the Hope Scholarship, the first of its kind in America, would require that school districts routinely tell the state how many Hope notification forms they’ve given to parents.

Currently, there is no such requirement, even though districts are required by law to notify parents about the Hope Scholarship within 15 days of a reported incident, and to provide them the Hope form they need to start the application process. (The scholarship is administered by Step Up For Students, the nonprofit that hosts this blog.)

The Florida Department of Education will consider the changes at a June 19 workshop.

Lawmakers created the Hope Scholarship in 2018, led by then House Speaker and now Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran. Students are eligible if they report being victims of bullying or similar incidents, including assault, battery, hazing, harassment, and sexual misconduct. They can use the scholarship to attend private schools, or to transfer to another public school.

At present, 429 students are using Hope at private schools, even though tens of thousands fall into the eligibility categories and state officials projected in 2018 that as many as 7,000 a year would use them. The scholarships are worth about $7,000 a year.

To date, the best available evidence suggests a leading reason for the gap is that districts are not telling parents they have this option.

Seventy-one percent of Hope parents surveyed by the Learning Systems Institute at Florida State University said they learned of the scholarship through other means, such as private schools, internet searches and social media. Two-thirds disagreed or strongly disagreed that the incidents were investigated in a timely manner, and many expressed frustration with district officials who they said didn’t know the legal requirements or didn’t want to follow them.

Hope Scholarships are funded by individuals who contribute up to $105 in return for sales tax credits on motor vehicle purchases. So far this year, they’ve contributed $60.8 million. By law, unused Hope funds can be used for the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for lower-income students.

June 11, 2020 0 comment
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Education and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceFeaturedFlorida Tax Credit ScholarshipGardiner ScholarshipHope ScholarshipNewsReading ScholarshipSchool Choice

Auditor General releases annual review of Florida scholarship programs

Jon East April 24, 2020
Jon East

In its fifth annual audit of Step Up For Students, the state’s largest nonprofit scholarship funding organization, the Florida Auditor General today issued what amounted to a clean bill of health.

The report included findings on data procedures and scholarship purchase returns, both of which have been fixed by the organization, while more broadly concluding: “Our audit procedures and tests of selected Step Up records and accounts found that Step Up generally complied with the applicable provisions of State law.”

The audit covered Step Up’s administration of four state-authorized scholarships in 2018-19: the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for K-12 students from low-income and working-class households; Gardiner Scholarships for students with special needs; Hope Scholarships for students who have been bullied in public schools; and Reading Scholarship Accounts that provide help for elementary public school students who are struggling in reading. Collectively, the programs served about 116,000 students that year.

The first finding related to Social Security numbers. The auditor said Step Up was not fully notifying Tax Credit Scholarship applicants of the purpose and authorization for collecting student Social Security numbers. It also questioned whether Step Up was sufficiently restricting internal computer access to such numbers. The organization responded by adding a new notice to all families when the 2020-21 scholarship application season opened in January. It also embarked on a review of database permissions for every staffer, limiting access to Social Security numbers to only those whose job required it, and creating a new process for constant review.

The second finding was with the Gardiner Scholarship, which allows students to spend money on a variety of educational needs beyond just tuition and fees. The report said Step Up was sometimes failing its own policy of posting a timely credit to each student’s account when a household returned a purchase made through authorized online vendors. The audit found 22 returned purchases worth a total of $16,327 that were not credited back within Step Up’s 14-day guideline. By way of comparison, that same year, 2018-19, Gardiner students spent a total of $21.9 million on instructional materials. Step Up reported the problem was remedied with automation.

In his formal response, Step Up president Doug Tuthill thanked auditors for their professionalism and wrote that: “We value the insights and recommendations that contribute to process improvements that strengthen our organization.”

Step Up For Students hosts this blog. 

 

April 24, 2020 0 comment
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Parents of bullying victims: Florida school districts failing to inform about school choice scholarships

Ron Matus March 13, 2020
Ron Matus

Florida school districts are routinely failing to notify parents of bullying victims that their children are eligible for new school choice scholarships aimed at giving them safer options, say parents who responded to a survey about the new program.

Districts are required by law to notify parents about Hope Scholarships after bullying incidents are reported. But 71 percent of Hope parents surveyed by the Learning Systems Institute at Florida State University said they learned of the scholarship through other means, such as private schools, internet searches and social media.

The survey size is small – 49 of 122 parents who secured the Hope Scholarship in its inaugural year. But their responses may help explain why two years after its creation, the scholarship is only serving a few hundred students, even though tens of thousands of students every year meet the eligibility criteria.

There are 368 Hope students this year, up from 127 in year one.

“Nobody at the public school told us anything about it even after repeated instances of bullying and us complaining about it,” one parent wrote.

“The school seemed very hesitant to give me the (Hope Scholarship notification) form,” wrote another. “I had to go to the office and basically demand it and make them sign it.”

Former Florida House Speaker and now Florida Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran spearheaded creation of the Hope Scholarship in 2018. The first-of-its-kind scholarship gives victims of bullying, harassment and similar incidents the option to attend private school or transfer to another public school.

The new report is rife with heart-wrenching quotes. One victim was slapped in the head 20 times in class. One had his head slammed against a concrete wall so hard it made him dizzy. Another had his lunch stolen nearly every day by kids who would eat it, step on it and throw it in the garbage. “I was crying in the car,” said the parent of another, “and (my child) is like, please mama, I don’t want to go back to that school.” The school climate, said yet another, was “like a slaughterhouse.”

Two thirds of the parents disagreed or strongly disagreed that the incidents were investigated in a timely manner or taken seriously by the district. Many expressed frustration with district officials who didn’t know the legal requirements for Hope – or, in their view, didn’t want to follow them.

By law, school districts must inform parents about the Hope Scholarship within 15 days after incidents are reported. They must provide the parent with a completed Hope notification form that verifies the incident was reported and the parent was informed. The form is needed to start the application process.

“Staff seemed to view the completion of the form as admitting their own guilt in some way,” one parent wrote. “There was resistance to signing at first until I produced the statute and accompanying memo from the (Florida Department of Education).”

In light of an ongoing debate about policies regarding LGBTQ students at some private schools, it’s worth noting that several Hope parents said their children were bullied in district schools because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation.

“He was ostracized from his peers and when kids would hang out with him, they would get bullied as well or told to watch out, if he touches you he’ll make you gay too,” said one. “My son was repeatedly called names such as f—–, gay boy, loser, etc. along with adult language,” said another.

Hope Scholarships are worth about $7,000 a year. They are funded by contributions in return for sales tax credits on motor vehicle purchases. So far this year, taxpayers have contributed $42 million.

The parent survey is part of a program evaluation required by statute. The Florida Department of Education hired the Learning Systems Institute.

Among other findings:

·       Most Hope Scholarship recipients are white (48 percent). Most were in middle school (47 percent). Bullying was the most common incident reported (34 percent).

·       Most respondents said the application process was easy (83.7 percent) and most disagreed or strongly disagreed that it took too long (75.5 percent).

·       Seventy-three percent said finding a safe school using the scholarship was very easy or somewhat easy. Twenty-seven percent found it somewhat or very challenging.

·       Respondents gave their children’s new schools high marks for safety, environment and engagement. On a scale of 1 to 4, overall ratings for the new schools averaged 3.58, compared to 1.85 for the prior schools.

One Hope parent said her son was two grade levels behind in reading in his prior school “because of all the issues.” But in his new school he revved two grade levels ahead.

“It’s the best experience I could have ever hoped for,” she said.

March 13, 2020 0 comment
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