Analysis: Hobbs’ effort to repeal school choice program could doom scholarships for 29,652 Arizona students

Empowerment scholarships for 29,652 Arizona students could be on the chopping block if Arizona’s Governor Katie Hobbs’ efforts to repeal the program are successful.

Hobbs’ executive budget from early January 2023 proposed reversing the state’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program, an expansion which allowed any K-12 Arizona student to receive a scholarship worth up to $7,000 enabling them to attend a school outside the public school system.

There are 29,652 Arizona students benefiting from the ESA program as of the first quarter of 2023, according to a Grand Canyon Times analysis of Arizona Department of Education data.

If the ESA program is rolled back, scholarships would only be available to students who met certain requirements, such as identifying as having a disability, attending a low-performing school, or residing on an American Indian reservation.

Steve Smith, Arizona state director of the American Federation for Children, told the Grand Canyon Times that rolling back ESAs could affect school choice and aid extended to low-income students.

“If the ESA program were to be eliminated, nearly 50,000 families would have their education of choice ripped away from them, including special needs and disadvantaged families,” Smith said in February 2023, before the program exceeded 50,000 students.

Gov. Hobbs claimed in a PBS interview that the school scholarship system will “bankrupt the state.”

“This scholarship system we are under now doesn’t provide real choice in educational opportunity for most families. It diverts resources from schools,” said Hobbs.

Data from the Common Sense Institute, however, indicated a scholarship costs Arizona taxpayers $7,000 compared to the $12,000 per student cost in the public school system.