Senate Finance Committee Restores Previously-Cut ESTF Seats
The South Carolina Senate Finance Committee is currently debating this year’s budget. On Tuesday, April 7, Senator Greg Hembree (R – Horry) introduced a budget proviso that would:
- Prohibit “unbundlers” in the Education Scholarship Trust Fund (ESTF) program;
- Grandfather “unbundlers” from this school year into the program, but treats them like Option 1 (district-approved and district-oversight) Homeschoolers; and
- Prevents the program from expanding to its statutorily-mandated minimum of 15,000 seats, instead keeping it at 10,000 seats.
This proviso would have devastated those 5,000 newly accepted students who were already notified of their acceptance and making plans for next school year. The Senate Finance Committee voted 16-3 in favor of the provision, with 5 Senators abstaining.
However, during yesterday’s debate, the Committee reconsidered their vote on that amendment. Senator Larry Grooms (R – Berkeley) led the charge in stating that he was not in favor of cutting the program, and wanted to change his vote to oppose the proviso. Following some debate, the Committee opted to amend the proviso to allow the program to expand to 15,000 seats but keep the restrictions on “unbundling” for this coming school year.
Although there is still more work to do on “unbundlers” in the ESTF program, we are grateful that the Committee opted not to punish newly-accepted students by stripping them of their ESTF awards in response to a debate that they are not participating in just yet.
Check out the full Committee discussion on this proviso below!
