School Choice & Charters

Trump Calls for Congress to Fund School Choice for Disadvantaged Students

By Lesli A. Maxwell — February 28, 2017 1 min read
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In his first official address to Congress, President Donald Trump didn’t veer from his agenda for K-12 schooling, urging lawmakers to “pass an education bill that funds school choice for disadvantaged youth, including millions of African-American and Latino children.”

But the president offered nothing specific about what his vision for a federal school choice program would be or what form it would take. He first pitched a $20 billion federal school choice program as a candidate.

In the speech, he said disadvantaged families “should be free to choose the public, private, charter, magnet, religious, or home school that is right for them.” One of his invited guests for the address was Denisha Merriweather, a Florida woman who attended a private school using that state’s tax credit scholarship after floundering in public schools, the president said. She flourished in private school, went onto college, and is now in graduate school, Trump said.

On Friday, Trump will visit an Orlando private school that serves a large number of students who receive tax-credit scholarships, the Orlando Sentinel reported. A White House spokeswoman told the newspaper that the president will attend a “listening session on school choice.”

To read Education Week‘s full take and analysis on Trump’s joint address to Congress, read Alyson Klein over at Politics K-12.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Charters & Choice blog.