One major difference between Governor Bill Lee’s proposal this year to let families use public dollars to send their children to private school, sometimes referred to as school vouchers, and last year’s plan that failed, is a provision designed to ease fears about potential lost revenue for school districts.¶
Under the Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement (TISA) school funding formula, state dollars follow students to the school they attend, and opponents of the Governor’s Education Freedom Scholarship Act have worried school districts would lose needed revenue when students leave for private school.¶
The bill lawmakers will begin debating in next week’s special session has a provision designed to appease those concerns. It guarantees that a school district’s allocated state funding for education “shall not decrease from one year to the next year due to the disenrollment of students.” Under the legislation, the state would allocate additional funding to ensure district’s do not receive less funding than the prior school year because of the program.¶
Lee Administration Policy Director Michael Hendrix explained how it would all work in a School Choice Forum earlier this month hosted by Latinos for Tennessee, saying the administration remains committed to funding public schools.
