According to Colorado Revised Statute 22-36-101, commonly known as the Public Schools of Choice Act of 1990 or open enrollment, students can choose to attend a school outside of their neighborhood school boundaries, in either their own school district or another Colorado public school district.As of 2013, Alabama and Maryland are the only states without some sort of open enrollment policy, whether voluntary or mandatory, intradistrict or interdistrict, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.Amber Whetstine, executive director of learning services for Falcon School District 49, said the district embraces school choice and offers a variety of schools from standard brick-and-mortar schools to charter schools to online and blended learning opportunities. ìOne of our five district priorities is to have a portfolio of exceptional schools for our families to choose from,î she said. ìSome families believe in the neighborhood school concept, but we also have families that want to select schools that may be outside their neighborhood borders because of the particular programs or learning styles that a certain school promotes.îD 49 is unique in that it has espoused the Innovation Act of 2008, which provides additional choice options for families, Whetstine said. D 49 has four zones, three are geographic and one is comprised of online and blended learning opportunities.ìEach zone offers all the basic educational opportunities for families, but they also have specialized educational opportunities as well,î Whetstine said. ìWe are one of the few districts in the state that is considered an innovation district for that reason.îSome states participate in a voucher program: Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin and Washington, D.C., according to the National Conference of State Legislature website.ìSchool vouchers, also referred to as opportunity scholarships, are state-funded scholarships that pay for students to attend private schools rather than public schools,î the NCSL website states.Josh Cunningham, senior education policy specialist with the NCSL, said under the voucher program state dollars are directly given to parents to pay for private school tuition. ìThe benefit is that it gives the parents more options,î Cunningham said. ìThey can pick a school that fits the needs of their child. Private schools are free of the standardization of public schools, which makes them attractive to some parents.îHowever, the voucher program is not perfect, and has caused reason for concern, Cunningham said. ìThere are a lot of concerns about whether or not a state should be funding a student to go to a religious school,î he said. ìThere are questions about how equitable the voucher program is if you are low income. You may not be able to transport your student to a different school, so it sometimes ends up that higher income students are the only ones getting the benefits.îTo combat this, each state that participates in the voucher program has certain eligibility criteria, which students must meet to receive a voucher, according to the NCSL.†Vouchers are often limited to low income students or†students with disabilities, who might need schools that cater to those with disabilities, Cunningham said.†However, in some instances, the eligibility requirements do not address income levels. According to the NCSL website, in Maine,†students residing in a district that does not operate any public schools or does not contract with schools of another district are all eligible for the voucher program, regardless of their income level.The Douglas County School District in Colorado attempted to launch a pilot voucher program, but the Colorado Supreme Court rejected the program in June 2015, according to court documents on the Colorado Supreme Courtís website. The court ruled that the program violated a state constitutional provision that prohibits funding of religious schools with public money. Douglas County is appealing that decision to the United States Supreme Court.ìA lot of other states do have the same things (as Colorado) written into their constitutions, but their supreme courts say that the state is funding the parent and the parent gets to choose,î Cunningham said. ìArizona is the only other state like Colorado to overrule a voucher program.îMany people have expressed concern that the voucher and school-of-choice programs create competition that could be detrimental to schools, Cunningham said. ìIt is a concern that people express a lot, the whole competition between schools thing,î he said. ìBut students are moving around constantly. If a school is failing, it is probably going to have some sort of intervention from the state anyway. Usually, there are not enough students leaving one particular school to negatively impact it.îWhetstine said, ìThat is not something we are worried about in District 49. We believe that families should have the option to send their students to the school that best matches their childís needs. We continually ask our families what types of schools and programs they would like to have continue and what additional opportunities they are interested in. We have been able to keep families in the district from leaving by providing programs that we did not previously have.îBoth Cunningham and Whetstine said they have not heard about any other districts in Colorado attempting to pass a voucher program. Cunningham said if Douglas Countyís U.S. Supreme Court appeal is approved, that might change, but the Supreme Court has not yet indicated whether it will hear the appeal.PART TWO: The NFH will review education savings accounts and scholarship programs and more on brick and mortar choices.
