Greater educational freedom is coming to New Hampshire

Last night, in a 14-10 vote, the
New Hampshire
Senate
passed legislation
to expand the
school choice
system in their state.

Specifically,
the bill
will raise the household income cap under which students qualify for Education Freedom Accounts, which are essentially vouchers. Previously, a student’s household income had to be less than 300% of the federal poverty line to be eligible for the program. But, under the new legislation, the number was raised to 350%.

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Fox News reports
that last year, the number of students in the program nearly doubled to 3,025. However, hundreds of students were turned away because their families made too much, “including about 100 whose income would have qualified under the proposed higher cap.”

The bill passed the state legislature earlier this year, and it is now headed to Republican Gov. Chris Sununu’s desk, where he will sign it into law.

This is clearly a small step towards universal school choice, but it is nonetheless a welcome one.

I say it is a welcome development because parents know best what educational environment their child will thrive in. However, under the status quo, students are too often forced to go to particular schools based on nothing more than their zip code.

The reason for this is straightforward: the government has a monopoly on K-12 education. Consequently, parents are often deprived of the right to choose which school their children will attend, unless they can afford otherwise.

New Hampshire’s school expansion means a greater number of families will soon be eligible for Education Freedom Accounts, which means a greater number of students and parents will have a genuine choice about what school to attend, whether it be private or public.

Scholar and activist
Corey DeAngelis
has led a largely successful effort over the past few years to transform how we think about school choice. It is often painted as “taking money away from traditional public schools.” However, DeAngelis points out that the primary goal of education policy is to educate students — not to ensure a certain number of dollars goes to one school or another. As such, a set amount of public money should follow the child to whatever school he or she attends. Those who have tried to convince the public otherwise — groups such as teachers’ unions — have a personal stake in keeping the money flowing toward traditional public schools.

As an expression of this, he coined the
phrase
“fund students not systems.”

And the movement toward school choice is growing. Over the past few years,
dozens
of
states
have passed legislation to expand school choice. Additionally, some states, such as New Hampshire, have moved to expand their already existing school choice programs.

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The only way these moves can be successful, though, is if there is
buy-in
from the public. It is a good thing surveys consistently show that school choice is popular among those of all political stripes. A June 2022 poll
found
that 67% of independents, 68% of Democrats, and 82% of Republicans support school choice. Each of these numbers represented an increase relative to April 2020.

It is clear that school choice is winning across America. The only question is, which state will be next?

Jack Elbaum is a summer 2023 Washington Examiner fellow.