Notes

Arizona Private School Scholarships
Arizona lawmakers have made it possible for families to choose the school that best meets their children’s needs and aspirations. By creating a statewide open-enrollment law and one of the nation’s strongest charter schools’ laws, they gave parents a powerful choice that puts students at the center of their education. And they gave families even more choice by allowing them to direct public tax dollars into scholarship programs that can be used for private school tuition or extracurricular activities like sports, art, music and field trips. But the state’s current governor is calling for a sharp reversal in these efforts, threatening to throw the lives of many children into turmoil and disrupt the economic stability of their families at enormous expense to taxpayers.

In the last few years, the state’s education tax credit has become a model for other states looking to increase school choice and parental control. The program allows individual taxpayers and corporations to donate to certified School Tuition Organizations, which then uses the funds to award scholarships to students to help them attend a qualifying private school. The credits are worth up to $731 per person or $1,459 for married couples filing jointly. And because they’re a credit, not a deduction, they reduce the amount of state income tax you pay (though you can only claim up to your tax liability before applying credits and deductions). The scholarship programs have drawn praise from both liberals who dislike vouchers but think this is an appropriate use of government funds for educational choice, and conservatives and libertarians who worry that vouchers will lead to federal meddling in the classroom.

In addition to the tax-credit scholarships, Arizona also offers a credit for public school fees. The credit is available for individual taxpayers who pay certain types of fees to public schools, and you can claim it by completing Arizona Form 322. For example, the fee payments can be for things such as a child’s participation in a particular extracurricular activity. Another option is the Empowerment Scholarship Account, or ESA. The state’s newest educational choice initiative lets families use up to $40,000 in public funds for their child’s education, and it became available in 2022. To qualify, you must submit an application to a Certified School Choice Scholarship Organization, or STO. Then, the STO will determine if your family is eligible and provide you with an application to complete and submit to the state. The STO will then review the application and, if accepted, send you an approval letter to be attached to your state tax return. If the total amount of the approved ESA credit is less than your state tax liability, you will be able to carry forward any unused credit amounts for up to five years. You can also make an ESA contribution through payroll withholding. To find out more about your options, we recommend that you visit the Catholic Education Arizona website.

Since 1998, Catholic Education Arizona has awarded more tuition scholarships than any other school tuition organization in the state of Arizona. Visit the Catholic Education Arizona website at https://catholiceducationarizona.org/ to learn more. They’ve graduated over 153,000 scholarships totaling in excess of $338 million dollars to students in need of tuition assistance to attend one of 38 schools in the Diocese of Phoenix. The funding the schools receive is from Arizona’s Private Education Tax Credit legislation that was passed in 1997. This law allows individuals the option to direct their tax liability to tuition scholarships, and in 2006, the Low-Income Corporate Tax Credit legislation was passed offering the tax credit to Arizona corporations as well. Arizona was the first state in the nation to adopt this legislation and to date, 20 states have followed their lead by passing some form of tax credit legislation. Visit the Catholic Education Arizona website to find out more today!

Website: https://catholiceducationarizona.org/tax-forms/