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Study: School choice in Indiana led to savings for state

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Special to redefinED

Researchers at Ball State University used data on 2019-20 student transfers among public, public school charter, and private school options to examine differences in state funding.

Editor’s note: This post appeared earlier today on Inside Indiana Business.

A new study from Ball State University shows Indiana’s school choice options saved the state nearly $90 million for the 2019-2020 academic year. The study, conducted by the Center for Business and Economic Research, indicates the savings equates to about 1% of the state’s general fund spending on education.

The study, “School Choice and State Spending on Education in Indiana” examined transfer data on students at traditional public school districts and charter schools in 2019-20. It also looked at students attending private schools through the Indiana Choice Scholarship program.

Dagney Faulk, director of research at the CBER, co-authored the study along with CBER Director Michael Hicks and says the findings will help taxpayers and lawmakers better understand the advantages and disadvantages of the use of vouchers, charter schools and open enrollment programs.

Charter and voucher programs, the university says, allow students to attend schools other than the traditional public school in the district in which they live. Open enrollment, however, allows students to attend a traditional public school outside of their home district. 

“As of yet, we don’t have much information about the academic impact of school choice in Indiana, but this analysis examining the fiscal impact shows that choice has resulted in savings to the state because more students transfer out of districts with the highest levels of per-student funding than into these districts,” Faulk said.

The study says 5.7% of public and private school students transferred from their home district to another traditional public school. However, nearly 4% attended charter schools and 3.2% attended private schools using vouchers.

To continue reading, click here.

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Education and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceEducation PoliticsEducation Savings AccountsFeaturedFlorida Tax Credit ScholarshipNewsParental ChoicePrivate School ScholarshipsSchool ChoiceTax Credit Scholarships

New LIBRE Initiative leader sees education freedom as ‘ultimate endgame’

Lisa Buie
Lisa Buie

Daniel Martinez, former aide to Sen. Manny Diaz Jr., is Florida coalitions leader for the LIBRE Initiative.

As a kid whose family immigrated to the United States from Cuba in 1992, Daniel Martinez knows what it’s like to suddenly have choices after years of living without them.

He also knows it takes hard work to build the American dream from scratch.

“My mom taught herself cosmetology, and she’s a nail technician, so she would work from home to raise my brother and me,” said Martinez, a longtime legislative aide who recently was tapped to be Florida coalitions director of the LIBRE Initiative.  “My mom, I believe, is the American dream.”

The LIBRE Initiative is the Hispanic-facing affiliate of Americans for Prosperity, a national grassroots activist group that espouses small government and greater individual freedom, including education choice. Earlier this year, Americans for Prosperity and LIBRE sponsored a six-figure public relations campaign to help pass the largest expansion of school choice in Florida’s history.

Martinez sees education choice as a key issue for all Floridians, but especially for the Hispanic community, whose members may not always live in the ZIP code of their dream district school.

“Too many people just send their kids there because ‘that’s where we go,’” said Martinez, who graduated from a South Florida district high school in 2000, two years before Florida Gov. Jeb Bush signed landmark legislation that established the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship Program. The program, which provides tax credits to corporate donors, funds scholarships for students who meet state income guidelines. Step Up For Students, which helps manage the scholarship program, hosts this blog.

Martinez sees his new role at LIBRE as a natural next step in his career after spending nine years working as a legislative aide for state Sen. Manny Diaz Jr., R-Hialeah.

While working at Publix, Marinez considered a career in business but discovered his passion for policy and politics while studying at Florida International University. Two of his professors, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, and another who worked as a pollster, held political discussions after class. Martinez rarely missed a session and devoured books on the subject.

In 2012, he found his niche as a volunteer for Diaz, who had just won his party’s primary for a House seat.

“That was like getting your master’s and your doctorate,” he said.

Martinez loved interacting with policymakers, lobbyists, parents and educators and signed on as Martinez’s aide after he won the seat. When Diaz won his state Senate seat in 2018, Martinez followed him.

“He’s like family,” he said of the former Senate education committee chairman. He said working with Diaz prepared him well for his role at LIBRE.

 “While others might say, ‘Print something,’ or ‘Get me a soda,’ I was taught ‘You need to learn and be able to explain this because there is going to be a time when I can’t,’” he said. “Those are the tools that helped me so much. Leading LIBRE in Florida, my job is to create more leaders. We want more leaders for the next generation.”

For that to happen, he said, education freedom is paramount. Even in Florida, which already has one of the most robust choice programs in the United States, he said, “It’s not about whether we have school choice; it’s about how far do we want to go.”

As Martinez sees it, the goal is universal choice.

 “Really, it’s about the erasing of district lines,” he said. “The money should follow the students.”

Martinez also is interested in homeschooling, learning pods and other innovative forms of education that involve unbundled services from various providers and which are made possible for all regardless of income through a choice system that uses flexible spending accounts, also known as education savings accounts or ESAs.

For him, learning doesn’t just happen in the classroom; it continues during tennis practice and music lessons and evening tutoring sessions.

“That to me is the ultimate endgame,” he said.

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The 20-year-old scholarship success that might not have been

Patrick R. Gibbons
Patrick R. Gibbons

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, center, applauds on the floor of the Florida House of Representatives after the passage of the Family Empowerment Scholarship program in 2019.

Twenty years ago, on June 13, 2001, Gov. Jeb Bush signed HB 21, a taxation relief bill that carried within it Florida’s third private school scholarship program. The program, then called the Florida Corporate Income Tax Credit Scholarship, would enroll its first students in the spring of 2002 and would grow to award more than 1 million scholarships by 2021.

But the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship was not destined to become the nation’s largest private school scholarship of its kind. In fact, it almost didn’t happen.

The bill carrying the program, SB 1048, was nearly killed on the second day of the legislative session. Politics, budget pressures, competing voucher ideas, the need to overhaul Florida’s election system after the debacle of the 2000 presidential election, and an anti-scholarship lawsuit looming overhead, meant the new scholarship’s future was far from certain.

The scholarship program was introduced under companion bills HB 271, sponsored by then-freshman Rep. Joe Negron (R-Stuart), and SB 1048, sponsored by Sen. Ken Pruitt (R-Port St. Lucie). Both versions allowed corporations to earn a dollar-for-dollar tax credit when donating to low-income scholarships.

The House version limited corporate donations to 75% of the taxes due but otherwise did not cap the total available tax credits. The Senate’s bill capped the program at $50 million in available tax credits and limited corporate donors to $200,000 in total tax credits annually.

The House version offered scholarships worth up to $4,000 for private school students, $1,000 for home education students, and $500 to cover transportation costs for students wishing to attend out-of-district public schools. The Senate’s bill offered no scholarships for home education, while the private school scholarship was worth $3,500. The public-school transportation scholarship remained the same.

Florida was spending $7,512 per pupil in public schools at the time according to the U.S. Department of Education.

Both bills limited scholarships to the more than 1 million students who were eligible for the National School Lunch Program, a federally assisted meal program operating in public and nonprofit private schools and residential childcare institutions.

School choice advocates quickly organized the handful of existing scholarship parents to meet with legislators, a move that put Democrats in a tough spot publicly.

“I personally resent the parading of Black parents through the halls of this Legislature and holding them up as examples of people who will receive vouchers,” Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Miami) fired back. “I personally resent the stereotype.”[1]

But it was no stereotype.

Those “parading” about the halls of the Legislature were parents of the 51 students on the Opportunity Scholarship in 2001, a program that offered scholarships to students attending public schools the state had given a letter grade of F. At the time, only students attending two high-poverty elementary schools in the entire state qualified, and most of those students happened to be Black.

The House moved swiftly before passing the bill 71-46 on March 8.

The Senate’s bill did not fare as well.

It nearly met disaster in the Senate Education Committee on March 7.  Two Republicans, Sen. Alex Diaz de la Portilla of Miami and Sen. Donald Sullivan of Seminole, joined Democrats to vote down the scholarship bill 8-5.

Diaz de La Portilla argued the bill was “poorly written,” and cited confusion as to whether corporate donors could earn tax credits by buying books rather than funding private scholarships.[2]

Sullivan, however, would provide a way forward by moving to reconsider the vote, which according to the Associated Press, was “a procedural move that kept the bill alive.”[3]

The Senate’s scholarship bill would re-emerge in the Senate Education Committee on March 13, where it passed on a party line vote. It reached the Senate Finance and Taxation Committee on March 28 and again scraped by on a party line vote.

Despite passing in the House weeks before, the senate’s companion bill would linger on life support in the Appropriations Subcommittee on Education. By April 11, the bill was dead.

During this time, the Legislature had been negotiating with Bush over his priorities, which included eliminating the intangibles tax and $300 million in tax cuts.

Senators were unsure of where the money might come from. The proposed voucher programs could cost around $50 million or more, while fixing the electoral system could cost another $40 million. Other spending priorities also competed for tax dollars.

“The last couple of years it has sort of been his way or the highway,” Sen. Jim King told the Associated Press about the legislature’s relationship with the governor.[4]

Something would have to give.

The Legislature had been working on two other voucher bills, the smaller of which garnered the most attention and criticism. HB 303 and its Senate companion, SB 504, would create $3,000 private school scholarships for students attending overcrowded public schools.

Bill sponsor Rep. Carlos Lacasa (R-Miami) argued the program was necessary to relieve crowding because the state’s spending of $8.5 billion on school construction had failed to remedy the situation.[5]

An estimated 40,000 to 235,000 students would be eligible — a fraction of those eligible under the tax credit scholarship bill.

“Here we see the main character, Hannibal Voucher, attempting to cannibalize our public school system,” Rep. Bob Henriquez (D-Tampa) said of the bill.[6]

Columnist Daniel Ruth called it the “Gutting Public School System Act.”[7]

Wilson, the representative from Miami, predicted public schools would still be struggling in five years, while Rep. Eleanor Sobel (D-Hollywood) argued it would be helping mostly children from well-off families.[8]

HB 303 passed the House 63-54 on March 21, 2001, but Senate President John McKay and Senate Education Committee Chair Pruitt had no intentions of moving the bill forward. The tax credit scholarship faced criticism too.

“The tax credit bill is a gimmick to get around potential constitutional pitfalls for existing voucher programs,” said Rep. Lois Frankel (D-West Palm Beach). “It’s very clever and very scary.”

“I don’t feel that taking money out of public schools is right,” said Sen. Ron Klein (D-Delray Beach), who sent his own children to private schools.

According to a Tampa Tribune survey at the time, legislative Democrats were more likely than Republicans (32% to 27%) to send their own children to private schools.[9]

By April 24, the specter of a voucher defeat in the Florida Supreme Court passed as the justices declined to hear the case and allowed the October 2000 First District Court of Appeal ruling to stand. That ruling declared the Opportunity Scholarship program did not violate the state’s “paramount duty” to fund public schools.

However, the tax credit scholarship still had no active bill in the Senate.

On May 4, during the waning hours in the last day of the 2001 session, Pruitt filed an amendment to HB 21, a bill that eliminated the intangibles tax, a priority of Bush. The amendment included a $50 million tax credit scholarship program with scholarships worth up to $3,500. The bill passed 25-14 at 8:30 p.m.

As the midnight deadline ticked closer, the bill was sent to the House, where it passed 72-44 at 9:45 p.m.

Bush would fulfill his promise to eliminate the intangibles tax and get $175 million in tax cuts — and Florida would get a new tax credit scholarship program. Two decades later, the program would raise more than $4 billion to fund more than one million scholarships for low-income and working-class students.

It is a success that has never been duplicated by any other state — and one that almost didn’t happen.

[1] Staff Writer. (March 9, 2001). School vouchers lawmaker says blacks are being stereotyped. Miami Herald.

[2] Twiddy, D. (March 7, 2001). Panel Rejects GOP Voucher Bill. Tallahassee Democrat.

[3] Staff Writer. (March 7, 2001). Bush’s priorities seem in jeopardy from start. Associated Press/Bradenton Herald.

[4] Kallestad, B. (March 6, 2001). Tax cut, vouchers and election reform agreement far away. Associated Press.

[5] Kleindienst, L. (February 21, 2001). Key house committee Oks voucher bill; foes said measure would let students avoid the state assessment test that public-school students take. Orlando Sentinel. See also, Hegarty, S. (March 18, 2001). Lawmakers debate 2 new voucher bills. St. Petersburg Times.

[6] Staff Writer. (February 10, 2001). House Democrats criticize school voucher plan. Florida Times-Union.

[7] Ruth, D. (February 9, 2001). A voucher is a voucher is a… Tampa Tribune.

[8] Hallifax, J. (March 22, 2001). Debate on the floor. Tallahassee Democrat.

[9] Feller, B. (April 10, 2001). Voucher views based on beliefs. Tampa Tribune.

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Commentary and OpinionCustomizationDemographic ResearchEducation and Public PolicyEducation ChoiceEducation SpendingFeaturedParental ChoicePrivate School ScholarshipsSchool Choice

Florida is overcoming ‘systemic privilege’ by putting students before the ‘system’

Special to redefinED
Special to redefinED

Editor’s note: This commentary from William Mattox, director of the Marshall Center for Educational Options at the James Madison Institute, appeared Friday on RealClear Policy.

Throughout America, a very important – and highly racialized – conversation is taking place about overcoming injustice. Here in Florida, that conversation has often gone in a markedly different and very promising direction. And schoolchildren of color are among the greatest beneficiaries.

The conversation in Florida, at least as it pertains to education, has focused on what might be called “systemic privilege.”

If you are unfamiliar with this (de-racialized) mash-up term, try this: Go to a public forum and suggest that all families should be treated fairly – that all parents should have access to the per-pupil funds for their children even if they choose to educate them outside the public school system.

Then, watch the defenders of “systemic privilege” come out of the woodwork. 

“You want to take money out of the public school system,” they’ll say. “We should be spending more on the public school system, not on school choice alternatives for students outside the system.”

To the defenders of “systemic privilege,” the system is more important than the students. And the people who benefit from the system’s privileged position matter more than the families trapped within its coercive tentacles.

Thankfully, here in Florida, a bipartisan (and multi-ethnic) coalition of leaders have been working to end “systemic privilege.” Over the last two decades, they have succeeded in adopting education choice policies that enable low- and middle-income parents to find the learning environment that best meets their children’s unique needs, aptitudes, and interests. 

As a consequence, nearly half (48%) of all Florida K-12 students currently attend something other than their zoned public school. And the Florida Legislature just passed a measure adding 61,000 students to Florida’s K-12 scholarship rolls.

Lest there be any doubt, Florida still has some work to do – in education and in other areas. But the Sunshine State has done more to end “systemic privilege” than any other state. And Florida students are greatly benefitting.

In fact, Education Week now ranks Florida No. 3 in the nation in K-12 student achievement. A research team from Harvard and Stanford found that, over the last quarter-century, Florida students showed greater learning gains than the students in all but one other state (even though Florida increased per-pupil spending less than every other state!).

And a recent study found that the (mostly minority) students in Florida’s largest school choice scholarship program are more likely to go to college – and to graduate – than their public school peers. 

So, the future is bright for Florida’s students – and not just for those taking advantage of Florida’s new learning options. In fact, a recent National Bureau of Economic Research study found Florida public school students showed significant academic improvement after school choice was adopted (presumably because greater competition spurred greater public school achievement).

In other words, Florida’s rising tide of education choice is lifting all boats. And while ending “systemic privilege” in K-12 education is not the only “justice” issue Americans should be concerned about, no other policy reform is apt to do more to alter the trajectory of the next generation than education choice.  

During the civil rights era, the city of Atlanta used to boast that it was the City Too Busy to Hate. Considering its remarkable success in K-12 education, Florida now probably ought to be known as the State Too Busy Creating Bright Futures for All Our Students to Let Haters Divide Us Along Racial Lines.

Which may just be another way of saying, once again, that Florida is the Sunshine State.

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Diverse choices in education provide opportunity

Special to redefinED
Special to redefinED

More than 250 students at Jones High School in Jacksonville, which last year celebrated its 125th anniversary, attend a physics class. That’s more than the number at most Orange County high schools.

Editor’s note: This commentary from Denisha Merriweather, director of public relations and content marketing at the American Federation for Children and founder of Black Minds Matter, appeared Thursday on orlandosentinel.com.

As the Black daughter of a 16-year-old mother raised in poverty in Jacksonville, I was delighted to see Jones High School (in Orlando) create a great physics program. The school is an inspiration.

But I was perplexed to see Jones’ success used to disparage the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship – a program that turned my life around.

In a recent Orlando Sentinel op-ed (”Jones success illustrates inadequacy of vouchers,” May 16), former Polk County School Board member Billy Townsend perpetuates three myths about education choice in Florida.

Myth 1: Private-school scholarships have high dropout rates due to poor school quality.

Urban Institute studies of the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship program found that scholarship students were more likely to attend and graduate from college than their peers who remained in public schools. Townsend ignores this success and instead points to a statistic in the studies; from 2004 to 2010, 61% of recipients left their scholarship within two years, and 75% within three years.

He claims this proves families’ dissatisfaction with schools, which constitutes “an extraordinary record of failure.”

That conclusion is not supported by surveys showing 90% of scholarship parents satisfied with their schools. Nor is it supported by the report’s authors, who addressed this misreading on the Urban Institute’s blog: “Our study finds positive effects on college enrollment and degree attainment, which makes it unlikely that broad dissatisfaction or dropping out is driving students to stop using the scholarship” (emphasis added).

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American Federation for Children future leader Nanya Morris-El on the importance of role models in beating the odds

redefinED staff
redefinED staff

Editor’s note: This profile is the third in a series featuring former Florida Tax Credit Scholarship recipients who are included in the 2020 cohort of the American Federation For Children’s Future Leaders Fellowship.

Ask Nanya Morris-El the secret of his success and he’ll respond without hesitation: powerful role models and a state scholarship that allowed him to attend a private school.

Both were crucial, he says. But if it hadn’t been for the scholarship, the role models would not have appeared in his life.

As one of six children, Nanya had become accustomed to going without the extras his peers enjoyed. His parents sometimes struggled to put food on the family’s table. There was no educational option for Nanya beyond his zoned public school, despite the fact it was overcrowded and didn’t always feel like a safe place.

Nanya had difficulty learning to read, and to comprehend what he was reading. He was held back in second grade, which only served to further undermine his confidence. By the end of fourth grade, he felt he was swimming against a strong current he was powerless to overcome.

“I was unable to receive the help and attention from teachers that I needed,” recalls Nanya, who is now 23. “Because I came from a lower income family and this elementary school was the only one in my school zone, I had to continue going there.”

Then his family learned about the education opportunities available to Nanya and his siblings through the state’s system of education choice scholarships. One, the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship, had a track record of assisting low-income families like Nanya’s by providing them with financial resources to send their children to private schools that could be a better fit for them.

Nanya started attending Academy Prep Center of Tampa and his life changed.

Among the resources available to him at Academy Prep was an additional English class that helped him with grammar and reading comprehension. He had the opportunity to go on field trips to museums that expanded his world. Most important, he established relationships with teachers who were willing to go out of their way to guide and nurture him.

One of those teachers was Regina Fuller, who introduced him to a book he still remembers fondly, “We Beat the Streets.” The book recounts the story of three boys growing up in a neighborhood choked with guns and gangs. The boys overcame these obstacles, went to college and became doctors.

“I started to learn that just because you’re in a challenging situation now, it doesn’t mean you can’t get ahead in life,” Nanya said.

Another mentor was his science teacher, Ralph Moore. Under Moore’s careful tutelage, Nanya reveled in hands-on activities that “went beyond the textbook” and kindled in him a love of science and nature.

Also on Nanya’s list of role models was Chris W. Altenbernd, a former appellate judge who had served more than 27 years on Florida’s Second District Court of Appeal. Nanya came to know Altenbernd in his role with the Greater Tampa Bay Area Council of Boy Scouts of America.

“He taught us how to tie knots and volunteer in the community,” Nanya recalls.

Nanya graduated from Academy Prep and earned a seat at highly competitive Jesuit High School in Tampa. He continued to excel academically and was accepted at Florida State University, where he majored in chemical engineering. He graduated in December, one semester ahead of schedule.

Now, he’s participating in General Electric’s Operations Management Leadership Program, which consists of three eight-month rotations that allow students to build leadership and functional skills through challenging assignments. He just finished a rotation at a healthcare manufacturing plant in Florence, South Carolina, and has moved on to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he’ll be immersed in the manufacture of X-ray imaging and CT scanners.

He’s also deeply involved in advocating for the type of education choice he says is responsible for getting him where he is today. As a member of the American Federation For Children’s Future Leaders Fellowship, Nanya travels the county meeting with families who struggle, as his did, with finding the best education options for their children. He writes op-eds for media outlets and talks to policymakers, all in an effort to dispel myths and spread the word about education choice.

For Nanya, this type of advocacy work has become second nature.

“Once I grasped its importance, I thought to myself, ‘If this is taken away, students just like me are not going to have the opportunity to go to a school like Academy Prep or Jesuit,’” he said. “You go to your public school, and if that doesn’t provide for your needs, that’s it. You just have to deal with it. I didn’t think that was the right way to go about it.”

For more information about scholarship programs administered by Step Up For Students, click here.

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How Florida’s school choice programs create good citizens

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Special to redefinED

Families, advocates and legislators joined Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis at Christ the King Catholic School in Jacksonville last week to celebrate the signing of a sweeping education choice bill that will extend private school opportunity to more students.

Editor’s note: This commentary from John Legg, co-founder and CFO of Dayspring Academy charter school, appeared this morning in the Tampa Bay Times. Legg served as chairman of the Senate K-12 Committee from 2012-16, speaker pro-tempore of the Florida House of Representatives from 2010-12, and chairman of the House K-12 Committee from 2008-10. He is a member of the board of directors for Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.

Over the years, 11 high-quality research studies have examined the impact of private school choice programs on core democratic values such as political tolerance and civic engagement. According to the meticulous research and advocacy group EdChoice, six found positive impact, five found no impact and none found negative impact.

To some, this is counterintuitive.

Aren’t public schools the place where those values are instilled? How could students who choose private schools become more tolerant, more likely to volunteer for community service, more likely to better grasp basic knowledge about government and politics?

There are many reasons. But I think this is the good that comes when people are afforded the dignity and respect that comes with freedom, especially the freedom to determine the educational destinies of their children.

To continue reading, click here.

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American Federation For Children future leader Hera Varmah on overcoming challenges, being a role model

redefinED staff
redefinED staff

Editor’s note: This profile is the second in a series featuring former Florida Tax Credit Scholarship recipients who are included in the 2020 cohort of the American Federation For Children’s Future Leaders Fellowship.

Hera Varmah had a dream as far back as middle school: to go to college, learn how to make healthful, tasty foods available to everyone, and do something important in the world.

But she had two challenges.

Math and science didn’t come easily to her, and her teachers, overwhelmed with more students than they could handle, didn’t have time to help her.

And because she was one of 11 children in a household of 16, she sometimes “got lost in the sauce” at home.

“I was struggling but I didn’t want my parents to know,” said Hera, now 21. “I hid my tests. When they finally found out, they were more upset that I didn’t ask for help when I should have.”

Once apprised, her parents took immediate action, enrolling Hera at Academy Prep Center of Tampa. The move would not have been possible without assistance from a Florida Tax Credit Scholarship for lower-income students. Several of Hera’s siblings already were attending Academy Prep on the scholarship and were reaping excellent results.

Things didn’t change for Hera overnight. She continued to struggle because she wasn’t prepared for the rigorous college-prep curriculum. But with guidance from patient and persistent teachers, she began to make a turnaround.

“I got math tutoring at lunchtime, I got science tutoring during recess,” Hera said. “At first, I didn’t want to do the work. I’m really glad they pushed me.”

In hindsight, Hera doesn’t fault the teachers at her public school for her lack of progress there.

“They had so many students to focus on,” she said. “My teachers at Academy Prep were a lot more understanding of what I needed to focus on. They took the time to know every student.”

One teacher in particular was instrumental in Hera’s life.

“He asked if I had ever used note cards,” she said. “I tried that and did really well. I got my first A. He said, ‘We’re going to start using them for everything.’ Now I can remember what I learn without the note cards.”

As Hera’s grades improved, her confidence soared. She graduated from Academy Prep feeling more than ready for the rigors of Tampa Catholic High School. Four years later, in 2017, she was accepted at Florida A&M University.

She graduated this month with a degree in food science, well on her way to fulfilling her middle school dream. 

Today, she can only imagine where she would be without the benefit of education choice and the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship.

“I probably would be where my elementary friends are now,” she said. “A few of them went to community college, but most of them started working right after high school. I probably would have struggled through high school and wouldn’t have gotten into a good college. It’s scary to think about.”

Hera considers her parents’ decision to participate in the state scholarship program the best decision they ever made.

“It gave my siblings and me a chance to be successful,” she said. “My oldest two brothers set the example for the rest of us to follow.”

In the years since, Hera has set the example for her younger brothers and sisters.

“It forces you to become a leader when you have a lot of siblings looking up to you, following you,” she said.

Hera’s leadership skills have found a new arena in the education choice advocacy world. Recently, the American Federation for Children selected her as a member of its Future Leaders Fellowship. She writes op-ed pieces for national newspapers and makes public appearances to talk to families and students about education choice options in their states.

“I think the best way to advocate for school choice is to tell my story,” she said. “Telling my story is like a tool. I know a lot of people don’t realize the difference these scholarships can make.”

She sees this as important work despite her busy schedule – and as something she plans to continue doing even though she’s no longer a student.

I definitely plan to advocate forever,” she said. “Wherever I go, I’ll be advocating.”

For more information about scholarship programs administered by Step Up For Students, click here.

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