Bulk of this year’s money will go unused; as of mid-January, parents had spent about 10% of $30M approved by Legislature
By Skylar Laird
SCDailyGazette.com
COLUMBIA — House Republicans on Wednesday, Feb. 26, easily passed their plan for reviving K-12 private tuition payments in South Carolina, as the floor debate provided new insight into how parents are using their taxpayer-funded scholarships.
The vast majority of what the Legislature allocated last year won’t be used — at least, not this school year.
The bill approved 79-38 mostly along party lines — no Democrat voted for it — is purposely similar to the voucher law partially thrown out by the state Supreme Court last September. Republicans expect a do-over before the state’s high court with whatever they pass.
And this proposal “is what we need” to get a ruling that allows private tuition payments to resume, House Education Chairwoman Shannon Erickson, R-Beaufort, told her colleagues.
At issue is the state constitution’s ban on public dollars directly benefiting private education. The House bill attempts to get around that by putting a trustee in charge of the transfers.
Rep. Justin Bamberg, a Bamberg County Democrat, likened the move to money laundering.
“The state effectively money launders it through this third-party trustee, and then they go to a private business,” he said.
Rep. Neal Collins, who was among five Republicans to vote against the bill, argued the scholarships are still funded with public money and, therefore, still unconstitutional.
“You really have to do some mental gymnastics to think this public money is not public money,” said the Easley Republican.
Where the money went
Numbers he provided from the podium offered the first public details on how parents used their allotments this school year, which the Department of Education has previously declined to provide the S.C. Daily Gazette.
The September court ruling came after the state transferred the first of four, quarterly $1,500 allotments to parents’ accounts. While the ruling abruptly stopped all private tuition payments, it kept the rest of the law intact, meaning the transfers continued for still-allowed expenses.
As of mid-January, computers and other “technological devices” made up the single biggest category of parents’ spending, at $1.5 million total over 4,387 transactions, according to a spreadsheet the Department of Education provided the Gazette after Collins’ floor speech.
That represents just under half of the $3.1 million spent by Jan. 17 through the online portal. (Parents direct how their money’s spent through the portal. They do not receive cash or reimbursements.)
It’s great that students received roughly 4,400 computers, Collins said.
“What I’m concerned about is, nothing stops anybody from returning these computers” and pocketing the money, he said.
According to the education agency, that’s not possible. Any returns result in a credit to the parents’ account rather than a cash refund or gift card. Students are allowed to buy a computer that costs less than $1,500 every other year. The transactions would include printers, keyboards and other allowed expenses. Gaming computers are not allowed, according to the program handbook.
The second biggest category was school tuition, at about $970,000 over 947 transactions. The spreadsheet doesn’t provide any breakdown on how many students were involved in those transactions. At least some of them could be for fees charged by public schools for students who transferred from another district. The ruling didn’t stop those.
What the numbers clearly show is just how much of the $30 million the Legislature allocated for the program’s first school year will go unused.
Even before legislators finalized the state budget last year, it was clear the full $30 million wouldn’t be necessary.
While up to 5,000 Medicaid-eligible students could participate the first year, most applicants didn’t qualify. Less than 2,900 students were enrolled by the deadline, the Daily Gazette reported last May. A $6,000 scholarship for each enrolled student meant less than $17.3 million total could be spent by parents this school year.
As of mid-January, the department had transferred about $6.7 million to the accounts for 1,845 students statewide, according to the spreadsheet. The third, $1,500 installment of the scholarship was set to be transferred to parents’ accounts by Jan. 31.
Erickson attributed the low participation to private tuition payments stopping in September and parents being unaware of the program in its fledgling year.
The spreadsheet, which breaks down the number of participants per county, shows students in all 46 counties received scholarships.
Richland County, home to the state capital, accounted for the most students in a single county, by far, at 304; followed by Greenville (the state’s most populous county), at 160 students. Fifteen counties were in the single digits, with rural Bamberg and McCormick counties tying for the smallest number of students, at two each.
“We’ve got students in every single county using it, and those numbers will continue to grow,” Erickson said. “We barely got to roll it out with good information last year, and we know that there are other children that are interested in coming.”
But that wouldn’t explain why more than 1,000 of the students enrolled last May dropped out of the program entirely. (While 2,880 students were enrolled, the state shows 1,845 participants.)
Collins and other opponents offered possibilities: Rural students have few, if any, local private school options. A lack of transportation may be an obstacle for getting students to options that do exist. Private schools may not be accepting students who don’t meet their criteria, such as high grades, or if they have a behavioral issue. And even with a $6,000 scholarship, poor parents can’t afford schools that can charge several times that.
Under the 2023 law, eligibility expands in the upcoming school year to 10,000 students with family incomes up to 300% of the federal poverty level, which is about $96,000 for a family of three.
The application period closes March 15 under existing law.
More than 4,700 students have already applied, according to the state Department of Education.
What the bill would do
Republicans’ proposals, both in the House and Senate, would nix the application deadline but maintain the existing law’s income eligibility rules for next two school years. In 2026-27, 15,000 students from families who make up to 400% of the poverty level can participate.
Under the House bill, there won’t be any income limits starting in school year 2027-28, though there will be an application priority window for families up to 300% of federal poverty guidelines.
“That’s a handout,” said Rep. David Martin, R-Fort Mill. “That’s not helpful. That’s free money for rich people.”
And unlike existing law, both the House and Senate plans would open up eligibility to students already attending private schools. The 2023 law required students to be leaving a public school or entering kindergarten.
“I consider this a tuition discount for people who already send their kids to private schools,” said Rep. Heather Bauer, D-Columbia.
Rep. Jeff Bradley, chairman of the House education K-12 subcommittee, stressed that the program’s cost is a tiny fraction of the more than $14 billion going into South Carolina’s K-12 public schools this year from local, state and federal taxes.
State aid accounts for $6.7 billion of that total, representing an increase of $1.4 billion over five years, according to the state Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office.
“I think given the total amount we spend on education, it’s worth taking a risk to see if we can do something better about it,” said Bradley, R-Hilton Head Island.
Opponents argued that money would be better spent on bigger increases in teacher salaries.
Bamberg noted state funding for the scholarships will rise to an estimated $96 million in 2026-27 and potentially keep going up.
That amount may be comparatively small to overall spending statewide, he said. But it’s a huge amount for poor, rural school districts that pass along massive amounts of debt to pay for renovations or new schools, which Bamberg argued should be a state responsibility. In districts with little tax base, residents pay higher property taxes on their homes and vehicles to pay for school construction debt, because there’s no industry to pay the tab.
The voucher money could be used to pay off school debt burdening rural residents, he said.
“At this point to me, it’s so obvious,” Bamberg said. “This isn’t about giving everybody choice.”
An 80-32 vote Thursday returned the bill to the Senate, which can either agree to the House changes and send the bill to Gov. Henry McMaster’s desk or insist on its version.
How scholarship money has been spent
- Computers and technological devices: $1,503,010
- School: $969,651
- Tutoring: $265,502
- *Other: $150,039
- Instructional materials: $138,174
- Curriculum: $34,549
- Retailer: $28,929
- Textbooks and reading books: $13,366
- Therapist: $6,420
- Tuition and fees for online schools: $3,627
Source: SC Department of Education. Dollar figures are as of Jan. 17.
*The agency put all other expenses allowed by law into this category
Student participation
Students from all 46 counties have scholarship accounts. Here are the top 10 counties in participation:
- Richland: 304
- Greenville: 160
- Spartanburg: 148
- Lexington: 127
- Florence: 83
- Charleston: 74
- Anderson: 67
- Orangeburg: 66
- Dorchester: 63
- Berkeley: 61
The 10 lowest counties in participation:
- Union: 6
- Abbeville: 5
- Chester: 5
- Lee: 4
- Marlboro: 4
- Saluda: 4
- Allendale: 3
- Georgetown: 3
- Bamberg: 2
- McCormick: 2
Source: S.C. Department of Education
S.C. Daily Gazette Editor Seanna Adcox contributed to this report.
Skylar Laird covers the South Carolina Legislature and criminal justice issues. Originally from Missouri, she previously worked for The Post and Courier’s Columbia bureau. S.C. Daily Gazette is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
