Utah
How many Utah students will receive inaugural Utah Fits All Scholarship?
More than 15,900 applications on behalf of 27,270 students were submitted for the Utah Fits All Scholarship.
The application window for the inaugural K-12 school choice scholarship program opened Feb. 28 and closed on Monday. Utah lawmakers appropriated $82.5 million over the past two years to start the program, which will launch this fall with 10,000 scholarships awarded.
Scholarships can be used to pay for private education options such as private school tuition, educational software and hardware, microschool tuition and after-school programs. Each scholarship is $8,000.
“With the application period closed, I’m excited to see that 27,270 children have applied for the Utah Fits All Scholarship,” said Rep. Candice Pierucci, R-Riverton, sponsor of HB215, passed in 2023, which created the program.
“This is an exciting time for families and students in Utah as we increase options and opportunities for students in our state,” said Pierucci, chairwoman of the House Education Committee.
Passage of the legislation was a sea change in Utah education policy in that it expands the use of public money for private education choices far beyond existing programs for families of children with disabilities.
Scholarship awards and waitlist information will be provided to applicants on May 3, according to ACE Scholarships, which is managing the program under contract with the Utah State Board of Education.
Scholarships will be awarded based on the guidelines in HB215, which describe three levels of preference:
⋅Students whose family income is at the 200% federal poverty level or less.
⋅Students whose family’s income is between 200-555% of the federal poverty level.
⋅All Utah K-12 students regardless of family income.
Jackie Guglielmo, vice president of education savings account programs at ACE Scholarships, said “high demand for the Utah Fits All Scholarship Program is proof that Utah families are hungry for high-quality educational options.”
ACE Scholarships “is committed to ensuring the application and award process runs as smoothly as possible and we will continue providing frequent updates to applicants,” Guglielmo said.
Robyn Bagley, executive director of the parent advocacy organization Utah Education Fits All, said supporters were “not at all surprised to see such high demand for the Utah Fits All Scholarship as profoundly illustrated by the 27,270 student applications submitted to the program in its inaugural year. The outstanding response is indicative of parents’ growing inclination to shape their children’s learning journey.”
According to Bagley, nearly 13,000 individual student applications were received less than a week into the application period.
“We look forward to hearing the stories of what the scholarship students experience and accomplish in their first year when given the power to customize learning to fit their unique needs, values and passions,” Bagley said.
Pierucci said the Utah Fits All Scholarship “will empower families to make the best decisions for their kiddos in providing opportunities to learn in a way that makes sense for them.”
SALT LAKE CITY — A California man in Utah, as part of his duties with the National Guard, is accused of trying to solicit sex from a young teenager.
Joshua Ruben Rodriguez, 29, of Fresno, was charged Tuesday in 3rd District Court with attempted rape of a child, a first-degree felony, and enticement of a minor, a second-degree felony.
The investigation began when an agent with the Utah State Bureau of Investigation posed as a 13-year-old girl on a “popular social media site … in an attempt to locate and apprehend adults attempting to have sexual contact with children,” according to charging documents.
On April 16, Rodriguez sent the agent a message — believing he was talking to a teen girl — that stated, “I’ll be direct with you, I would like to get to know you and (have sex with) your mind into a daze to where you feel like a woman,” according to charging documents.
When the “girl” asked if he had a problem with her age, Rodriguez replied, “I don’t have a problem with your age,” the charges state.
The agent told Rodriguez to meet at an apartment complex in Salt Lake County where the girl lived, claiming her mother would be gone. When Rodriguez arrived, he was taken into custody, the charges state.
“(Rodriguez) does not have ties to Utah. He is a resident of Fresno, California. (He) was in town as part of his military service with the California National Guard,” prosecutors stated in charging documents while requesting he be held without bail pending trial.
ST. GEORGE, Utah (KUTV) — One person was hospitalized at the St. George Regional Hospital after a car rolled and caught fire just south of the Utah-Arizona border.
The Beaver Dam and Littlefield Fire Department in Arizona said its crews responded to the crash near the Black Rock Road exit – roughly two miles south of the state border – on Sunday night.
Upon arrival, crews put out the car fire and found the driver had left the scene. A single occupant, who was able to get out of the car on their own, was transported to the hospital by a Beaver Dam ambulance.
MORE | Crashes
Their condition has not been publicly released.
Details on what led to the crash and the condition of the driver were not immediately available.
The Beaver Dam and Littlefield Fire Department said law enforcement investigated the scene.
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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Jazz missed out on the NBA Playoffs, but still scored a big win thanks to a coin flip.
In Monday’s tiebreaker coin flip to determine who had the fourth-worst record in the league last season, the Jazz came out winners over the Sacramento Kings, who had the same 22-60 record.
Had the Jazz lost the coin flip, they would have been fifth in NBA Draft Lottery odds. Only the worst four teams are guaranteed to remain within the top eight of the lottery.
If Utah had fallen to fifth, there would have been the chance they could have dropped out of the top 8 teams in the lottery, and owed the draft pick to Oklahoma City, which was top-8 protected in a previous trade.
The Jazz now have an 11.5 percent chance to win the first overall pick in the NBA Draft Lottery, which is scheduled for Sunday, May 10.
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