Public School Choice

Public School Choice

The Public School Choice program provides parents, particularly parents with low incomes, with the option to enroll their children in intra-district, inter-district and open enrollment public schools. Public School Choice is addressed under Title V, Part B, Subpart 3 of NCLB. Under the public school choice program school districts must set aside an amount equal to twenty percent of their Title I allocation for supplemental education services and transportation

Programs and projects that funded through the Public School Choice program are required to use part of the grant to fund transportation services or the cost of transporting enrolled students to and from the chosen schools. This is inclusive of transport to and from both public charter and traditional elementary and secondary schools. The funds may not be used for school construction and no more than five percent of the funds may be used annually for administrative expenses, such as for evaluation activities, the dissemination of information or technical assistance. Student participation must be voluntary. If more students choose to participate in a program than can be accommodated, grant fund recipients are required to use a lottery-based system, not academic scores, as the basis for selecting students to participate.

Competitive awards are granted to state education agencies, local education agencies or partnerships that include both public for-profit or nonprofit organizations. Programs and projects that may be funded under the Public School Choice option may include those institutions that are prepared to engage in the following:

• Planning or designing a program (not to exceed more than one year).
• Making tuition transfer payments to the public elementary or secondary schools to which a student transfers under the program.
• Implementing capacity-enhancing activities that enable high-demand public elementary or secondary schools to accommodate transfer requests under the program.
• Paying for other costs reasonably necessary to implement a public school choice program.

Chosen recipients are granted awards in priority of applicants who (1) provide the widest variety of choices to students in participating schools; (2) those that have the greatest impact in allowing students who attend low-performing schools to attend higher-performing schools; and (2) those that propose partnerships to implement an inter-district approach to providing students with greater public school choice.

Recipients may make use of the grant fund to engage in any of the following activities:
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• Plan and design a public school choice program (for up to one year).
• Make tuition transfer payments to the public schools that students choose to attend.
• Enhance capacity-building activities in high-demand public schools allowing them to serve greater numbers of students (except that program funds cannot be used for school construction).
• Carry out public information campaigns to inform parents and students about public school choice opportunities.
• Pay other costs that are allowable and reasonably necessary to implement a public school choice program.

Supplemental Educational Services (SES)

NCLB establishes that SES be provided to students attending a school that has been identified as a school in need of improvement for at least 2 years. SES generally takes place outside of the regular classroom environment, such as after school or during the summer. Many types of organizations are eligible to become supplemental education service providers, including faith-based organizations, for-profit companies, school districts, private schools, charter schools and community groups. As of May 2008, there were 3,050 providers approved by states to offer supplemental services and during the 2006-2007 school year, nearly 530,000 students took advantage of the supplemental services option…