DFI’s Jim Blew on Federal Education Tax Credit Program

The Learning Curve Jim Blew

[00:00:00] Alisha Searcy: Welcome back to the Learning Curve podcast. I’m Alisha Thomas, one of your co-hosts, and guess what? We have another guest host today and you might recognize the voice. So let’s see. Hi, Alisha . It’s so good to be with you. Cara Candal is wonderful to have you. Welcome home.

[00:00:45] Cara Candal: Thank you so much. It’s been, it’s been way too long. I feel like the, I’m the OG of the learning curve, right?

[00:00:51] Alisha Searcy: You totally are. You absolutely are. So I feel honored that you’re co-hosting with me today.

[00:00:56] Cara Candal: Oh, it’s just such a pleasure to be with you. Anytime I get to hang out with you and the Pioneer Crew is my favorite time.

[00:01:03] Alisha Searcy: Yes. Well, we are happy to have you. Happy to have all that energy. And so we have a really good show today. We’ve got Jim Blew on who’s the co-founder of the Defensive Freedom Institute, and of course our friend Jim. Yes. Yeah, it’s gonna be a great conversation. But before we do that, of course we have to do our stories of the week. And since you are our guest host, I’m gonna ask you to go first with your story.

[00:01:27] Cara Candal: Oh, you’re gonna ask me to go first? Okay. Surprise. Surprise. Well. People who have been listening to this show for a long time, there have to be a lot of you, I bet, right? Know that any time a story comes out about Massachusetts, I have to take it, of course. ’cause I love to remind folks in the Commonwealth how much better we could be doing.

[00:01:45] And so, Alisha , it won’t surprise you to know that today I chose an article from the Boston Globe by Pioneer’s own, Jim Stergios, and the title is New Hampshire is Expanding School Choice. Will Massachusetts follow subtitle? Love it. Disenchantment with Public Schools is driving more families to seek alternatives to traditional public education.

[00:02:09] So Alisha , as you know, I am, um, in my day job. I am the Vice President of Policy at Excel and Ed, and I have to say I am formally the director of Educational opportunity at exceled. That’s where I started, and so I was. In charge of all things school choice, and what I watched from 2019 on was not the slow role of private education choice, but the absolute like comparative explosion of private education choice, mainly in the form of education savings accounts.

[00:02:43] In here we have. Jim writing in the globe about what is going on with our neighbors to the north, with New Hampshire. And I have to tell you, I, Alisha , I’ve had calls in the past year from reporters in the Massachusetts area one affiliated with the Boston Globe. Asking all sorts of questions like, Hey, why is public school enrollment declining?

[00:03:07] And I love to point people to the fact that, yeah, well one big reason is birth rates are declining, so let’s be honest about that. But the other reason is that since the pandemic, especially, we have seen as the subtitle here suggests disenchantment with our public schools. So I’m just gonna quote one thing from Jim’s article because I know that we have to to be expeditious with our time here, but he’s talking about a surge in school choice. So in New Hampshire, what they’ve basically done is they’ve, they’ve gone what we call Universal. So they’ve had an education scholarship account or education savings account for a few years now, but now they’re gonna roll out eligibility to.

[00:03:46] Every student in the state who wants it, which is a huge deal. And this is part of a broader trend. So enrollment in programs like ESAs has more than doubled since 2020, from roughly half a million to more than 1.2 million students. Newsflash, Texas just. Past its first DSA. It’s gonna probably double that number.

[00:04:05] It’s gonna be huge because Texas is huge. So to Jim’s question, is Massachusetts going to follow suit? I have to say I am. I am not optimistic. Boy would I like to be. I think we are gonna be. One of the last holdouts saying that you’re gonna have to be a family who has money to be able to access the education of your choice in the Commonwealth.

[00:04:28] We’ll be talking more with Jim Blew later about some options that could open up here. Again, I wish I were more hopeful about it, but this is just a timely article and I would encourage folks to go to the Globe and to read it because it talks about. The really great strides New Hampshire is making and we here in the Commonwealth like to think that other states should emulate us.

[00:04:51] And I would like to say, I think we need to look to our neighbors to the north to help folks understand what true educational choice looks like, what customizing education for all kids look like, including those who can’t afford the cost of a fancy private school education. So there’s my synopsis. It’s a really good read, Alisha .

[00:05:10] I highly recommend it.

[00:05:12] Alisha Searcy: And I really appreciate your perspective on this. As our listeners know, I’m a public school choice person. As a parent, I get, you know, wanting to have options within the private school space. But I think you raise a really good point when you talk about access. If you’re talking about choice, and depending on the state, some low income families will have access, some will not.

[00:05:33] Some use ESAs for different things, some use vouchers for others. So. You know, it’s a a lot of different things and I think states have their right to do that. I’m a public school choice person, but I think that these conversations are really important and I think those of us who are not private school people understand that it’s here to stay.

[00:05:52] And I think the question is, do you do it the right way? Are there, you know, do you have the right accountability systems in place? Are you following federal law? Are you ensuring that there’s no discrimination? Those kinds of things. So that’s why, and our public schools being invited to participate like they are in New Hampshire.

[00:06:09] There’s my last podcast. Thank you. I appreciate that. And so there’s a lot more to learn as we watch states unfold in their options, as you say, at the. This choice has exploded in a lot of ways. So I think this article that you point out as well of, of course, the discussion that we’ll have today with Jim Blew is quite timely.

[00:06:28] Absolutely. Thank you for that. So I wanna slightly change the subject and talk about an article that’s in Chalkbeat Trump White House to release some after afterschool money, but billions for education still frozen. Cara, you know, I’ve been talking about this for. Probably several months now. There are different articles that I bring up about the funding freezes happening in Washington DC that are affecting schools.

[00:06:59] And I try very hard not to make this political. And so I’m gonna do the same today. And I’m gonna say I think it’s a good thing that at least some funds, and in this case we’re talking about 1.3 billion. That will be unfrozen, I guess that’s the term, so that students can participate in afterschool programs.

[00:07:18] Now, here’s one thing that I find interesting. The administration was essentially reviewing the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program, which I know has been around for a while. It was when I was a superintendent, and essentially again, what it does is cover afterschool programs, summer programs, and because they were, the funds were frozen.

[00:07:41] There were a number of states, particularly in rural areas, that their programs had to shut down in the middle of the summer. They are not able to hire people for the next school year, and so part of what they were reviewing was making sure that they weren’t infringing upon the Constitution and they didn’t have DEI programs and all of these other things.

[00:08:02] And so what I appreciate most about this move at this moment. Is that there were actually members of the Republican party in Congress who wrote to the administration talking about the importance of this program and asking them to unfreeze the funds. And so I think that’s a good thing. I think it’s probably one of the first times we’ve seen where Republicans.

[00:08:26] Outwardly saying This isn’t the right move. We need you to release these funds. And so I wanna congratulate frankly, those republicans who have done that. Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia was one of 10 senators who did this. And so we thank them for that and I would like to see more.

[00:08:47] Republicans working with Democrats saying these are the right things for kids. When you’re talking about federal funds, you’re, you’re talking about tax dollars and more importantly, you’re talking about kids who need these services. You’re a mom, you understand? I’m a mom. I get what it means when you’ve got work and you need help and you need somewhere safe for your kid to go after school.

[00:09:09] These are just like bread and butter. Everyday working family types of things, and so kudos to those Republicans. I wanna see more of that and hopefully the rest of the $7 billion that have been frozen to cover things like migrant children. Title two, we’re talking about training for teachers. There are a number of other federal programs that are really important that schools really rely on, that I hope will also get reviewed and realize that this is really important and that Republicans and Democrats will.

[00:09:42] Come together and stand up on behalf of kids.

[00:09:46] Cara Candal: You know, Alisha , I will say very quickly, this is just such an important topic, and here’s a hope that I will express. I will express the hope that the federal government listens to its state leaders, no matter what state they live in. Red state or Blew state, because.

[00:10:01] Those state leaders who are going to be able to quantify the impacts, to quantify the impacts of this impoundment of dollars for afterschool programs, for all the other programs that you mentioned, to quantify those effects on families, on kids, on teachers, on schools, at the end of the day, on voters.

[00:10:21] Right. If not, right, if that’s what, if that’s what people are going to listen to. But I think that it is truly, you know, education is the domain of the states. States do need the federal money that they have been receiving since the, since the 1960s. It’s a really important topic, but it is only our state leaders, I think, who can listen to the people and they know the numbers.

[00:10:42] They have the data. Legislators can listen to the people, but state leaders can really help ’em understand the actual impacts of these moves.

[00:10:51] Alisha Searcy: These are very nonpartisan people who just wanna get the work done on behalf of kids. I couldn’t agree with you more. So thank you for that. So these great conversations, right, are going to continue with our guest who’s coming up, Jim Blew, as we said, co-founder of the Defense of Freedom Institute.

[00:11:07] So be sure to stick around and come back and listen to what Jim Blew has to say. Excited to hear from him.

[00:11:26] Jim Blew was a co-founder of the Defensive Freedom Institute. Previously, he served as the assistant secretary for planning, evaluation, and policy development at the US Department of Education. Prior to joining the department, Jim advocated for education reform across the country. His roles included serving as a director of the 50 can Affiliate Student Success, California National President of Students First and National Director of the Alliance for School Choice, and its predecessor of the American Education Reform Council.

[00:11:55] Jim also helped guide the Walton Family Foundation’s K 12 reform investments for nearly a decade before committing himself full-time to education reform. Jim worked at political and communications firms in New York and California. He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Occidental College and a Master’s in Business Administration from the Yale School of Management.

[00:12:16] Welcome to the show, Jim. Thanks. Happy to be here. So let’s jump in. Until early 2021, you served as an assistant secretary at the US Department of Education under former US Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, and then co-founded the Defensive Freedom Institute. Would you briefly share with our listeners some of your experiences as a senior leader within US ed, as well as what prompted you to CO-found DFI?

[00:12:42] Jim Blew: That story is actually one narrative. It was because of working in the Department of Ed. That we realized there was a need for a new federally focused group based in Washington dc That’s a risky thing to say because maybe the last thing DC needs is yet another organization advocating for good things.

[00:13:04] But what we realized is that our opponents to education reform were very involved in federal policy where there day after day, over years, and as a result, the role of the federal government had completely expanded funding for some good things were coming out of that, but the department itself had become.

[00:13:30] Counterproductive and an obstacle to reform across the country. So we decided to set ourselves up so that we could be a counter force against the hundreds of millions of dollars that are being spent every year to grow the federal role. And you know, we’re a small group, but I think we’ve had some great successes just with a little bit of pushback.

[00:13:54] Alisha Searcy: So going back decades, you’ve had an accomplished career with school choice initiatives and K 12 public ed reform efforts, while also working on charter schools and private school choice programs across the country. So for some wider context, can you talk about the state of play and progress on charters and private school choice programs before the COVID-19 pandemic?

[00:14:18] Jim Blew: Great. Let’s break up the history here. Yes, there was a big change with COVID and we can come back to that. Until that time, I, I started working on this, you know, some 30 years ago working with John Walton and others to just expand the options that were available to children. For us that included both public charter schools and private school choice.

[00:14:43] I wanna acknowledge that not everyone has that point of view. Some people feel really devoted to public charter schools, others just to private schools. But I’m one of those people that think we actually need both. And so that began some 30 years ago. I got involved just as a couple of charter school laws had been passed around the country.

[00:15:06] A lot of states were considering private school choice models. We struggled, I’ll just say for years we kept winning, but the gains were small. And by the time we got to, uh, when Betsy DeVos became Secretary of Education, charters were pretty well established. Private school choice was not, it was maybe less than a million kids across the country.

[00:15:31] Alisha Searcy: So Jim, in recent years, we’ve seen what someone would consider massive federal K 12 education expenditures after race to the top, essa, COVID relief, essa nap reading, and math scores have declined. Achievement gaps are largely unchanged or widening, and a lot of us are quite frustrated about that. Would you talk about the strengths and weaknesses of federal K 12 spending and policymaking, and where you think charter schools and school choice fit into this national crisis of academic stagnation?

[00:16:05] Jim Blew: The federal role in federal expenditures have grown dramatically. Since the Department of Education was established with that funding came a lot of strings about what states can and can’t do and reporting requirements back to the federal government. My position at this point is that the federal government does not need a Department of Education to fund the programs that it focuses on.

[00:16:37] Those include Title One students who are economically disadvantaged, IDEA, the individuals with Disabilities Education Act, that all those funding streams can be done by other agencies in the department. In fact. We’re once done by other agencies, and I’m at the point where I think the federal experiment with being heavily involved in education has been counterproductive and that we need to move to dismantle the Department of Ed and move those funding streams to other areas.

[00:17:15] There is of course the need to continue growing educational options for students across the country. I think there is a role for the federal government to play here. One is with charter schools. Remember most of the money that’s going to public charter schools now? Does not come through the quote charter school program Grants that are managed by the Department of ve.

[00:17:38] They come through Title one IDEA and other federal sources. The CSP or the charter school program grants are really for what we use to describe as unborn charter schools for schools that do not yet exist and that needs some initial funding in order to get them started, uh, get them off the ground. That funding should continue, I believe, because we need to continue to increase educational options around the country on private school choice.

[00:18:09] You know, in the last month, the Congress has approved a huge new federal tax credit scholarship program where donors can now get a one for one tax credit by contributing to scholarship granting organizations across the country. As you probably know, you can make a tax deductible contribution to those scholarship programs right now, but this gives them a little incentive and people will be able to.

[00:18:39] Get a one for one credit up to $1,700 of their tax liability for this. That is also a really important role going forward for the federal government because it allows every state in this country to make sure that children are given the opportunity to choose the school that they think is best for their situation.

[00:19:00] There’s a lot of opposition to this from the teacher unions and others who wanna keep children trapped in. Badly performing schools for those children. You know, I understand their position, but to me, we will never fix our education system. And remember, that’s what drives all of this. So many of our children are not learning to read, particularly in low income communities, that we need to give those folks an option to choose another school that will help them with their student achievement.

[00:19:33] Cara Candal: Jim, these are some great history lessons here. And so one of the things I’d like to pick up on what you’re saying about the federal role in expanding choice for families, could you first remind our listeners of what has, what was it first, a slow role and as I described at the outset of our show, has become.

[00:19:52] A much bigger landscape of school choice driven at the state level. Right? So we’ve seen the expansion in particular, of course, of education savings accounts, Texas is gonna really change the game. But remind us, you know, my relationship to Florida, Jim and that Florida at one point in time had the nation’s largest school choice program and that was a tax credit scholarship.

[00:20:15] Program. So can you just take a little bit of time to help us understand the connections between the success of state programs that we’ve seen, particularly with tax credits, and then the thinking behind where we are today with the federal tax credit, which if I remember correctly, was also something that was on Secretary DeVos’s agenda during the first Trump administration.

[00:20:38] Jim Blew: Let me start by continuing the history. In 2017, Betsy DeVos became the Secretary of Education. She is a well-known advocate for educational freedom. School choice, but education freedom of course includes freedom for teachers as well as families. Betsy so strongly believed in school choice that her basic platform with the Department of Education was, we need to expand school choice.

[00:21:11] She was on message for four years. No matter what problem you raised with her, she would explain to you how school choice could help it. That then led to COVID. The disastrous response by the adults in the system. So many schools around the country closed when they didn’t need to. It really set us back, and if you have any doubt about that, I can point you to the National Assessment for Educational Progress, which shows.

[00:21:42] Huge dip in student achievement, particularly again in low income communities,

[00:21:46] Cara Candal: particularly in states like my own, which were closed for business for a very long time.

[00:21:52] Jim Blew: Right. And that, that’s Massachusetts, not Florida, right? Correct, yes.

[00:21:57] Cara Candal: Yes.

[00:21:57] Jim Blew: In California and you know, other states that are dominated by the politics of the teacher unions. We saw this happen. When parents started seeing what was going on in their public schools, when they started experiencing some very bad instructional or witnessing bad instruction over Zoom, they all started wondering if Betsy DeVos was right. And we’ve watched since that time, state after state, I think there’ve been a dozen states now who’ve.

[00:22:30] Enacted private school, universal choice for their states. And yes, Texas was the last day one. It was a billion dollar program. Florida, of course, began its program back with Jeb Bush. Yes, sir. In 98. So it had a chance to mature and prove to the world. That school choice works, that student achievement increases that know that public schools are not destroyed.

[00:22:55] In fact, public schools have a little more incentive to improve their performance, and so those are the models that people are looking at across the country. We think this federal tax credit supercharges those efforts. We know, for example in Florida that they don’t get any federal money for those.

[00:23:15] Scholarship programs. Now they will have a vehicle to capture money that would’ve gone to the federal government, and instead can go to help local children with K 12 scholarships.

[00:23:27] Cara Candal: So Jim, help us understand, help our listeners understand because you and I spend a little too much time, like sort of head down in the wonky stuff, right?

[00:23:36] We’ve had these conversations previously, so talk us through, you already gave us some of the broad outlines that it is. You know, a tax credit, which I think most people will understand, but this is a 100% non-refundable credit against federal income taxes up to $1,700 annually. What are some of the finer details that folks need to understand to be able to take advantage of this and then.

[00:24:03] And you also, Jim, because you’re much more attuned to this than I, what was it like watching the sausage made? Because we’ve been talking about this federal tax credit, as I alluded to for years now, and it’s finally come to fruition. But what was won and lost in that process? That is policymaking.

[00:24:21] Jim Blew: So, yes, you are right. We’ve been working on this bill since Betsy’s team was in office. Uh, it took eight years to get this done. Some interesting history there. Betsy very much wanted the tax credit to reflect people’s charitable ability to give. And so if you had a higher income, you could give more. This is an important principle because most tax credits benefit the giver.

[00:24:50] This is the only tax credit that benefits charity benefits other people, and in fact, it will benefit only students. People are confused about this, so let me take a minute. When you hear non-refundable federal tax credit, that may sound like the donor is getting benefits, but no, that’s not what happens.

[00:25:09] The donor takes part of their federal income tax liability. And redirects it to an SGO. And so the only people who benefit financially from this are the children. It’s also an important principle because people think, oh, well then everybody’s automatically going to do this. And I think it’s a little more complicated.

[00:25:29] You need to want to help kids. You need to wanna help them with scholarships for options in order to go to the trouble to make the donation in the first place. The center of this program is not a state. It is not the federal government. It’s these scholarship granting organizations, and that is completely different than anything we’ve had in the past.

[00:25:52] And as a result, people are having trouble getting their heads around it. The reason it’s important. Is that everything about this program is voluntary, unlike anything in the government school systems, and I, I mean public school systems. When I say that, because there you’re compelled to go to school.

[00:26:11] You’re compelled to go, even if you’re a teacher, you’re compelled where you’re assigned here, everybody participates voluntarily. The donors. Can decide whether to contribute to an SGO or not. S gs decide if they want to accept money bundle that those funds together and create new scholarship programs across the country.

[00:26:34] Let me stop on that point for just a second. The s gs design, the scholarship programs, they’re not reliant on $1,700. They can set scholarships. To meet the needs of children. Let me give you an example of why that’s important. If you have a student with disability, it will cost more. As a result, you can give a higher scholarship to that child.

[00:26:57] If you’re in a state where all you’re doing is topping up a state program to cover the federal part of it, it’s a much lower scholarship. They will also design which students can receive, so every SGO doesn’t have to serve. The student, they can say, I wanna focus on students with disabilities or on students who are military connected, which is a problem in this country, making sure those kids get a good education.

[00:27:25] They might also choose to support families who are interested in classical education. Their opportunities are really endless, and we’re looking for a lot of creativity there. So the third part of this is that. Families participate voluntarily. Nobody’s compelled to accept a scholarship, and so as a result, you have donors, STOs, families all participating voluntarily, and it creates a very different dynamic than we see with our public schools.

[00:27:58] Cara Candal: Really important to point out too, that families can use this scholarship money, not just for private school tuition. They can use it for tutoring, they can use it for services for their child with special needs, books, computers, and of course these are all approved expenses. Somebody on the back end is checking to make sure that these are educational expenses.

[00:28:20] But Jim, a question that I have is, can, is an SGO able to say, I’m only going to fund. Private schools and a family who wants to say, you know, do a little bit more or use supplemental services with the money, are they able to do both?

[00:28:37] Jim Blew: So, it’s a great question, and some of it needs to be clarified through the treasury rulemaking, but the intent of the law was to allow any student to be able to get a scholarship to meet their needs.

[00:28:50] And if you’re in a public school that’s already funded and you need tutoring. The thought was those students would be able to go to a, you know, high dosage tutoring program that would help them remediate their reading skills. For example, and it’s another reason why this is not a voucher, because it can be used by public school students.

[00:29:13] The other way, public and charter school students might benefit from this. In states like Florida, you have part-time programming where yes, somebody. Only goes to the local high school to take calculus, for example. They now can do that because they can have a tuition. Scholarship to pay the public school system for it or the charter school.

[00:29:36] Cara Candal: Yeah. Well, and Jim, as you know, I like you, I’m an ardent supporter of all things school choice, and I think one of the really interesting components of this is it pushes us one step closer. Now, if we could get states to revamp their funding formulas to be more student centered, we’d be in an even better place.

[00:29:52] But it pushes us one step closer to blurring the lines between, you know, we’re one of the few countries where we draw this. Just huge distinction between private schools and public schools when our public school students should be able to take advantage of the services that you’re outlining here and maybe even participate in some of these programs that private schools participate in.

[00:30:14] So it’s fascinating. Now I do have a push for you though, Jim, because Right. Sausage making. So those of us who have been watching, you know, were pretty confident this thing was gonna go. But like I said, some things were lost, some things were won, and some things are still to be determined. I’m, as you know, sitting here in the commonwealth of Massachusetts and our state would have to opt in for families to be able to take advantage of this program.

[00:30:40] So walk me through. How you convince Governor Mara Healy and or how you can convince families who want this to advocate for themselves that a state like mine that is stridently opposed in most places to private school choice in any form, and many will see this as that. How do we talk to folks about the fact that the Commonwealth should allow families to take advantage of this?

[00:31:07] Jim Blew: So the Commonwealth and every state should take advantage of this program. But Cara, let me go back to your original question, which the bill that came out of the sausage making was fundamentally different than the one we put in at the beginning for two reasons. One is on the charitable contribution rather than allow.

[00:31:30] Very wealthy people to contribute a lot to the scholarship program. They put a flat $1,700 on all donors, so that makes the challenge of raising money a little bit more difficult. But in some ways, it’s gonna be healthier because we now have to sell this program to the American public so that they will donate to the program to make it work.

[00:31:53] So it’s an opportunity for us to explain to people why school choice works and is beneficial for students. The other major change you are alluding to is that states now have to opt in. What that means, literally is that the state has to decide which STOs can operate in their state and will be submitted in a list to treasury, and then treasury will know that you can get a tax credit for that if you’re not on that list.

[00:32:25] Then you can’t operate in a state. You can imagine Massachusetts taking the position, you know, they didn’t expand charter schools when they had the chance. They have eliminated any accountability at the high school level. So you can imagine that the teacher union has such control in Massachusetts that they wouldn’t wanna participate in a program that allows private school choice.

[00:32:50] But there are two things that we’ll be hammering on over the next several months. Number one is it costs a state nothing to participate in this program. It’s all voluntary contributions are on top of whatever the state is spending now. Number two, you can have scholarships that help all students, including students that are in.

[00:33:13] Unionized public schools and you can make sure that the tutoring is done by unionized teachers. So there’s some, you know, play here. And then the final issue that I’d like to raise, what’s gonna happen is people in Massachusetts can contribute to scholarship programs and get their tax. But if Massachusetts doesn’t participate, that means that Massachusetts are contributing to scholarship programs in say, Florida.

[00:33:43] And I think that will create more pressure on governors, even those who are very close to the teacher unions to participate.

[00:33:51] Cara Candal: No, these are, these are excellent points, Jim. And I have to say, I really think that an information campaign that helps inform students and parents of the potential benefits of the road, to your point, even in our public schools, right?

[00:34:03] A mayoral candidate of course, dropped by my house campaigning the other day, and I’m one of those annoying people that’s like, no, no, I would like to talk to you. I’d like you to sit here and listen to what I have to say. And one of the things he asked me was. Why don’t you have your kids enrolled in our local public schools?

[00:34:20] And I was really clear with him and I said, for me, there are opportunities that my kids get in the private school that they attend right now that they, I would have to pay for outside of the public school system. Right. And so, um, the idea that. Students enrolled in public schools could get a scholarship to pay for the extra math tutoring.

[00:34:39] And all that, I think should be really appealing to families, especially in districts that are losing enrollment. And this is something that of course, districts across the country are grappling with, right? They’re losing enrollment for many, many reasons. Jim, I wanna push on one more thing here, and this is not a personal opinion or a statement coming from me, but there’s a concern out there that somehow the federal education tax credit is going to interfere with the momentum that we’re seeing in states, right?

[00:35:07] This momentum that you’ve already described, how do you talk to folks about that piece of it?

[00:35:14] Jim Blew: So, uh, we do not believe it will break the momentum in the states where we already have a lot of momentum, and I mean by that, states that are considered red states where the Republican party dominates all of the various aspects of government.

[00:35:30] We would be really surprised if anybody said, well, if they’re gonna do that, then I don’t need to keep my. Foot on the gas here, it could happen. I, I don’t wanna say it’s impossible, but the reality is because their programs are working, because it’s improving student achievement, I think they’re not gonna say, well, therefore, we’re just gonna hope for voluntary contributions to come into my state.

[00:35:56] That just doesn’t resonate with me, and I don’t think it would resonate with any local politician. You have to remember something 90% or more of funding. For K 12 education comes from local resources. And so if you are a state legislator and you wanna make sure those resources are being used well, then you are going to make sure that there’s choice and competition to give the traditional system some incentives to perform better.

[00:36:27] And I think that most everyone in our world. Our wonky world era understands that, and so they won’t want to be backing down. On the other hand, this gives us an opportunity to expand educational options in Blew states or even purple states, where we can imagine somebody saying, well, you know, my. My constituents at very high level, 70% really want to be able to choose the best education for their child.

[00:36:59] So I’m going to allow that in this situation partly because it doesn’t cost me a penny to do that. And so for us, there’s a huge upside and really not much downside at all.

[00:37:10] Cara Candal: Yeah. Okay. Jim, before we let you go, I’m gonna ask you to make a, a prediction here, and that is once this thing goes into effect. How many families do you anticipate will take advantage of it in year one?

[00:37:24] Jim Blew: Hmm. Wow. So the tax committee made some predictions around this in order to score the bill. Their own predictions is that over the 10 year budget window, it will be about $26 billion, which implies what is that little more than. Around 3 billion a year. I think it will start at lower than that and ramp up to the point where the 26 billion, so that’s a low, a low assumption that we would have enough tax credit contributions to get to.

[00:37:58] 2 billion, 3 billion over time. Our aspiration is to get up to the $50 billion that Randy Weingarten has explicitly said would happen, and I’m taking her challenge to make sure that it does happen. That’s 30 million taxpayers would have to make these contributions and we’re game. We’re gonna try and reach that goal.

[00:38:20] Cara Candal: All right, Alisha , you heard it here.

[00:38:23] Alisha Searcy: I heard it. That’s a tall order. But if Jim is involved, hey, you never know.

[00:38:27] Cara Candal: That’s right.

[00:38:29] Alisha Searcy: Thanks Jim, for joining us today. Um, this is, I think, helpful for a lot of people to understand how this all works. And so it’s good to connect with you again and hear about your work.

[00:38:40] Jim Blew: Thanks. And it’s great watching you guys doing what you’re doing around the country too.

[00:38:59] Alisha Searcy: Well, Cara, just as expected, great conversation with Jim. He answered a lot of questions that I had. You know, again, still not into the private choice thing, but it’s really important to hear from him and understand how all of this is going to work.

[00:39:14] Cara Candal: No, Jim. Jim is amazing. He always brings great insight to the conversation, and I hope that our listeners enjoyed it as much as I did.

[00:39:22] Alisha Searcy: Indeed. Speaking of enjoying it has been wonderful to hang out with you today, but I realize that before I say goodbye to you and to our listeners, I gotta do our tweet of the week. You do. It’s a necessity. It is, and this week’s tweet of the week comes from education Next when given the choice between supporting something new or protecting the status quo.

[00:39:45] Voters have a tendency to sacrifice potential gains to avoid the perceived risk of loss, that is a problem. But we’ll have to discuss that another time. But make sure you check that out on education next. And so again, Cara, it has been wonderful to hang out with you, to hear your voice and your perspective on these things.

[00:40:04] I hope you enjoy coming back home for a little while.

[00:40:07] Cara Candal: I always do, and I’m really excited to see you in person sometime soon, I hope.

[00:40:11] Alisha Searcy: Yes, I will. Absolutely look forward to that. We need to make that happen. And for our listeners, make sure that you join us next week we’ll have Vincent Coretta Emeritus professor of English at the University of Maryland, author of Phyllis Wheatley, biography of a Genius in Bondage. So make sure you check us out next week.

[00:40:30] Cara Candal: Thanks Cara. Thanks Alisha . So great spending time with you and thanks, pioneer.

[00:40:34] Alisha Searcy: Take care. Hey, this is Alisha . Thank you for listening to the Learning Curve. If you’d like to support the podcast further, we invite you to donate at pioneerinstitute.org/donations.