Jude Schwalbach

1 week ago | reason.org | Jude Schwalbach

Good morning,More than 1.6 million students are using open enrollment, meaning approximately 6% of public school students in the 19 states examined use it to choose a public school, according to a new Reason Foundation report, “Open Enrollment by the Numbers: 2025.” The study reviews K-12 open enrollment, which lets students attend public schools other than their residentially assigned ones when there are open seats. Table 1 shows open enrollment participation in each of these states.

2 weeks ago | reason.org | Aaron Smith |Jude Schwalbach |Christian Barnard

With public school enrollment falling and the rise of school choice policies such as education savings accounts and public school open enrollment, portability is becoming an increasingly important feature of K-12 finance systems. Portable education funds are dollars sensitive to student enrollment, meaning school districts gain or lose funding with changes in student counts. Public schools generally lose funding when enrollment falls, but K-12 funding systems vary substantially across states.

2 weeks ago | reason.org | Jude Schwalbach

School choice continues to make significant progress across the country. Texas recently made headlines with Gov. Greg Abbott signing Senate Bill 2 into law, establishing education savings accounts that could be used by up to 90,000 students during the program’s first year to help pay for homeschooling, virtual learning programs, private school tuition and more.

1 month ago | reason.org | Jude Schwalbach

A new Reason Foundation report collected data from 19 states with K-12 open enrollment laws, regulations that let students attend public schools other than their assigned ones. While more than 1.6 million public school students used open enrollment across these states, the participation rates indicate that stronger policies could help thousands of additional students access public schools that better fit their needs.

1 month ago | reason.org | Jude Schwalbach

Executive summaryK-12 open enrollment lets students transfer to public schools other than their assigned one and is an increasingly popular form of school choice. There are two types of open enrollment: cross-district open enrollment lets students transfer to schools outside their assigned district, and within-district open enrollment lets students transfer to schools other than their assigned one inside their district.