In her proposed budget, Gov. Kelly Ayotte opens New Hampshire’s Education Freedom Account program to all students who’ve been enrolled in a New Hampshire public school (including chartered public schools) for at least a full academic year, the Josiah Bartlett Center has confirmed. The expansion would take effect July 1, 2026.
Students who currently have an EFA would remain in the program. Starting on July 1, 2026, the income cap at 350% of the federal poverty level would stay in place only for non-public school students.
Ayotte’s proposal would make approximately 98,000 public school students eligible for an EFA starting in the 2026-27 school year. There are currently fewer than 6,000 students enrolled in the program, which would make Ayotte’s plan a 17-fold expansion of the program.
That’s a huge win for school choice supporters and for students who have struggled to succeed in their government-assigned public school.
New Hampshire’s own state test scores show majorities of students failing to reach proficiency in science and math, and bare majorities performing at a proficient level in English, despite massive increases in school spending in the past quarter century.
New Hampshire public schools spend about $4 billion a year on K-12 public education, breaking down to an average of $26,320 per student in total spending. In addition, thousands of students experience bullying and other negative social interactions in schools that they don’t choose but are assigned to by their local governments. While most parents report being satisfied with their local public schools, many families want other options.
Ayotte’s budget would give most public school students the option of spending their state adequate education grant on an alternative education to the one provided by the school district in which they happen to live.
Because it excludes students who did not spend the full prior academic year in a public school, kindergarteners presumably would not be eligible.
The prior-year public school enrollment requirement poses some other potential problems.
It raises the question of whether a student has to be enrolled in the same school for the entire time. Do students whose families move from one district to another still qualify?
In addition, students who are bullied, mistreated by staff or experience a significant decline in academic performance during a school year would have to suffer through the entire year before getting an EFA ticket out.
Those issues should be addressed by legislators.
Ayotte’s position differs from the positions taken by the EFA expansion bills in the House and Senate. Both of those offer EFA access to all students eligible to enroll in a K-12 school. Yet Ayotte’s budget has given legislators a path to full universal eligibility.
Her line-item budget raises EFA spending from $29 million in the first year to $44 million in the second year. That $15 million increase would generally cover the cost of universal expansion in that year.
EFA students who switch from a public school to an EFA save the state money. The average EFA cost is $5,204 this year. Public school students cost the state an average of $6,177 in the 2023-24 school year, according to state data.
We published a study on Tuesday in partnership with EdChoice estimating that making all school-age students eligible for the EFA program would cost the state just $6.5 million in the first year and $11 million in the second year. That’s just a bit above the $15 million increase Ayotte built into her budget for the EFA program in 2027. But because the state spends more on public school students than EFA students, every student who switches from a public school to an EFA saves the state additional money. So legislators could pass universal expansion within the general scope of Ayotte’s proposed budget.
The language in Gov. Ayotte’s budget trailer bill is as follows:
VI. “Eligible student” means any student that is eligible to enroll in a public elementary or secondary school pursuant to RSA 189:1-a, is a New Hampshire resident under the provisions of 193:12, and meets one or more of the following conditions:
- Income eligibility.
Any student whose annual household income at the time the student applies for the program is less than or equal to 350 percent of the federal poverty guidelines as updated annually in the Federal Register by the United States Department of Health and Human Services under 42 U.S.C. section 9902(2). No income threshold need be met in subsequent years, provided the student otherwise qualifies. Students in the special school district within the department of corrections established in RSA 194:60 shall not be eligible students.
Any student full-time enrolled in a district or a chartered public school in grades kindergarten through 12 for the preceding academic year from the first day to last day of the school year as reported to the department.
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