Opponents of the LEARNS Act and its school choice provisions have had the Act tied up in litigation over when the act becomes effective. The main goal of the opponents is to delay the Act while they try to get signatures on a referendum petition to try to keep the act from becoming effective unless approved by a vote of the people in November 2024. It is not known whether they will be successful in their petition drive.
In the meantime, it is necessary for the state to move forward in its preparations to implement the first phase of school choice for this coming school year. That is why the Department of Education moved forward with emergency rules for this coming school year.
During the first phase only a limited category of students will be eligible to use money from the Education Freedom Account for attending a private school. About eighty three private schools are seeking eligibility to receive funds on behalf of students.
The Department of Education adopted emergency rules and sent them to the Arkansas General Assembly for approval. The first step was to present the rules at a joint meeting of the Education Committees of the Senate and House of Representatives. The Education committee endorsed the rules on Monday July 17. The final step in the legislature’s review is for the Arkansas Legislative Council to approve the emergency rules at its meeting on Friday, July 21.
One of the temporary rules that should help alleviate some concerns of school choice supporters is Rule 7.07.1 which says: “A participating school or service provider shall not be required to alter its creed, practices, admissions policy, or curriculum to receive approval from the Department or to accept payments from an EFA.” We at Conduit, think this is a critical provision and hope future legislation will amend the provision into the LEARNS Act.
The above provision is especially critical because the LEARNS Act includes some overly broad language requiring participating private schools to “Meet any other eligibility criteria set by state board rules;” Why do we think this protection should be added in the law? Isn’t the rule sufficient? The rule works for now, but rules can be nullified simply by adopting a new rule. Future administrations may not be as supportive of school choice as that of Governor Sarah Sanders. Better safe than sorry.
The emergency rules will provide enough guidance to get the program off the ground. The Arkansas Department of Education is working on developing permanent rules for the school choice program. The permanent rules will be subject to public comment. Parents who want school choice for their children should monitor the development of the permanent rules and should share their comments with the Department of Education. If not, the state board will only hear from opponents of school choice who want to burden the program with onerous rules so that more children will be stuck in the government school system.
Part of the success of private schools has been that they are not subject to heavy handed state rules. Rules beyond what is necessary to monitor the use of state funds are concerning and should be scrutinized closely by school choice supporters.
