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Although Jenaya Garrett works as a public school teacher, she has witnessed problems and deficiencies in the Texas system that have prompted her to send her two school-age children to private schools within the Houston Independent School District (HISD).
“There is no way I would send my students, my sons, to the schools that I’ve taught at," she said. "The campuses would not be advantageous for them with the way they’re currently being run."
Garrett is looking forward to the day that education savings accounts (ESA) become available in the Lone Star State.
“By having ESAs it would mean that my modest teacher salary wouldn’t be spent on school tuition,” she said. “The ESA would allocate funds that would help cover that same tuition that I’m paying out-of-pocket right now.”
More than 30,000 students nationwide outside of Texas have used ESAs as of 2022, according to ExcelinEd data, and public support for education choice policies like ESAs is at an all-time high.
For example, in a recent poll, 70% of Texans and 77% of parents of school-age children support ESAs.
“The public school teacher will always have students to teach,” Garrett said. “This option is not designed to hurt anyone. The option is designed to give students the choice of where they will be serviced, not if they will be serviced.”
ESAs allow the government to grant a certain amount of money for parents to use for private school, homeschooling, online learning or approved learning circumstances, according to Edchoice.org. In some cases, the ESAs will allow for part-time public school courses and private school courses, such as a trade school or apprenticeship.
“We set our students up for failure if we are not intentional about meeting their needs,” Garrett told the Houston Daily. “An ESA gives parents options and flexibility. Their student can attend a school where they can get the education they need.”
As previously reported in the Austin Journal, Gov. Greg Abbott supports passing a bill that would include an ESA program in Texas, calling ESAs beneficial for '‘every child in the state of Texas'’ at a rally in Corpus Christi.
“The Houston Independent School District is a broken system,” Garrett said in an interview. “The sheer size of the district makes it impossible to provide an education of the same caliber for all students. There is a clear distinction between the campuses that have and those that have not. The students need to be at the forefront of all benefits.”
The Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF) argues that it’s best for parents to have a wide variety of choices available for their children's education, including public school, charter school, private school or home school. ESAs are one way to help parents customize the best education for their children.
“I would love to see ESA[s] as an option for the 2023-2024 school year,” Garrett said. “Every day we talk about this, we think about it, we plan it is another day for a child to drop out or get sent to a behavioral campus or give up and put their head down.”
With an ESA law in place, parents could use funds for tuition and fees at a public or private school, school supplies, entrance exams or extra academic tests, tutoring or therapy, as well as for co-curricular activities, which are activities that add value to instruction, curriculum, and transportation, if approved.
“Options allow everyone to get to the place that’s best for them,” Garrett said. “Teachers are able to perfect their craft and essentially they become their business. Making sure that they are growing our children and have data to prove that ensures that teachers are always sought after in the workforce.”
ExcelinEd 2022 data shows eight states with ESA programs, including Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Mississippi, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Tennessee and West Virginia.
Earlier this year, Gov. Kim Reynolds of Iowa and Gov. Spencer Cox of Utah, both Republicans, signed bills to create ESA programs. Gov. Sarah Sanders of Arkansas, another Republican, recently announced her education program that includes an education freedom account.
Texas is next.
According to the Heritage Foundation, the Texas legislature is considering a proposal to give families greater freedom to choose their children's learning environment, and Gov. Greg Abbott wants to restore parents as the rightful people in charge of making the decisions for their children about their health care and about their education.
“Parents are going to have to do some legwork to put their child in a school and utilize the voucher in the public and charter sector,” Garrett said. “But at least now they have the option.”
Each year, parents can access a "digital wallet" that is funded by the state comptroller and can only be used for the academic needs of their children. TPPF's Parent Empowerment Act also will allow certain pre-approved vendors to be refunded.
“Every student will not go to Harvard,” Garrett added. “We don’t need a world full of Harvard business graduates. We need a world full of carpenters, doctors, teachers, tech gurus, motivational speakers, businessmen and women.
"The best we could do for our kids is to give our kids what they need to be successful and not push everybody down one path,” she added.