Last week, North Dakota was poised to become the 17th state to make every K-12 student eligible for school choice. Instead, the failure of Gov. Kelly Armstrong and state legislators to reach a compromise has left North Dakota families in the cold.
The North Dakota Legislature passed House Bill 1540, a bill to create a universal education savings account that would have empowered families with more education options. With the accounts, families could have used a portion of their child’s education funding for private school tuition, tutoring, textbooks, special needs services, or other approved educational expenses. The legislation would have put parents—not politicians and bureaucrats—in the driver’s seat regarding their children’s education.
Unfortunately for North Dakota families, Armstrong vetoed the measure.
The veto came as a surprise to many since the governor has been an advocate for education choice. In his State of the State address in January, Armstrong declared: “Our budget will support education savings accounts—funding set aside for each student to direct toward services or tuition across our public, nonpublic, or homeschool settings. The money follows the student, not the school, ensuring every student has the tools they need to prepare for college, a career, or the military.”
So why did Armstrong veto a policy that he recently championed?
In his veto message, Armstrong claimed the bill “falls far short of truly expanding choice as it only impacts one sector of our student population.” That’s an odd claim, as Armstrong recently signed a charter school bill that “only impacts one sector” of the student population, calling it a “win-win for North Dakota families” that would “improve student outcomes and increase parent satisfaction.” Indeed, the education savings account bill would have expanded families’ education options far beyond the charter school bill.
But that doesn’t mean the governor has abandoned his support for education choice. Armstrong’s veto message appeared to signal his support for a competing education savings account measure, Senate Bill 2400. Whereas the vetoed bill was limited to students enrolled in private schools, the Senate version included homeschoolers.
However, as I detailed previously, the House version had numerous advantages over the Senate version:
The House version proposes an appropriation of $40 million from the North Dakota general fund to provide scholarships worth about $4,000 each to an expected 8,000 students, plus administrative expenses. This is in line with Gov. Kelly Armstrong’s budget proposal, which set aside $44.3 million for education savings accounts.
The Senate version is expected to cost $58 million, but it provides smaller accounts worth $3,500 for low-income students enrolled in private school, $500 or $2,000 for other private schoolers, and $500 for homeschoolers. …
The Senate version also proposes unnecessarily restrictive and counterproductive regulations. The Senate bill would require that education savings accounts students at private schools be administered the same assessment required by the state at public schools. However, mandating a single test causes a host of problems, such as narrowing the curriculum, and induces private schools to eschew participation in the choice program. By contrast, the House version would allow families to choose from a menu of nationally norm-referenced tests, balancing the need for accountability and autonomy.
The Senate version would also have made the accounts available to students enrolled in public schools—a provision that greatly increased the cost of the proposal as the state is already paying for those students. By contrast, the state would save money whenever a public school student switched to the education savings account program, which costs less per pupil.
But despite the deficiencies of the policies in the Senate bill relative to the House bill, both would have dramatically expanded education freedom and choice in North Dakota. Sadly, instead of negotiating with the governor, the North Dakota House killed the Senate bill after the governor vetoed the House bill.
North Dakota lawmakers have missed an opportunity to empower families with greater education choice. Unless the Legislature amends one of the remaining education funding bills to include school choice, students trapped in schools that aren’t working for them will have to wait at least two more years before finding relief.
North Dakota families deserve better.
