ATLANTA – The Governor’s Office of Student Achievement has released a list of low-performing schools in Georgia whose students qualify to receive private-school vouchers.
Under legislation the General Assembly’s Republican majorities passed this year, eligible students who reside in a public school attendance zone that is in the lowest-performing 25% of all public schools in the state can qualify for up to $6,500 in annual funding for private school tuition, tutoring services, and other qualified expenses.
To qualify, the student must have attended the school for at least one year or be a rising kindergarten student. Parents must have been Georgia residents for at least a year, with exceptions for active-duty military personnel.
The list of low-performing schools includes schools in 107 school districts across the state and can be found at https://gosa.georgia.gov/georgia-promise-scholarship-sb233-school-list.
Legislative Republicans tried unsuccessfully for years to get a vouchers bill through the General Assembly before finally succeeding this year. To achieve that goal, the bill’s GOP sponsors agreed to concessions that set spending limits on the program.
Senate Bill 233 prohibits spending more than 1% of Georgia’s Quality Basic Education (QBE) fund on vouchers, a cap that is currently set at $140 million a year.
Still, Democrats argued that private-school vouchers will divert money from public schools while not truly serving the needs of students from low-income families. The bill’s opponents said $6,500 is not nearly enough to pay the tuition at most private schools.