The Florida House of Representatives has approved the bill to expand the state scholarship program to all students. Critics of the move called it a “coupon for millionaires”. And those who support it say it gives parents one more option in raising their children.
And one option could be the schools of the Archdiocese of Miami, where some 12,000 students use vouchers for tuition. Now they anticipate more interested families and there are already plans to reopen a Catholic school that closed 14 years ago.
The parish of Saint Malaquías, located in Tamarac, is already preparing for the start of the school year, which will begin in August.
After 14 years, the school will gradually reopen its doors, starting with the Pre-K and Kindergarten classes.
“The expansion of state scholarships as one more opportunity to help more families as it eliminates the income eligibility requirements that exist today,” says the archdiocesan superintendent of schools.
It is estimated that the vouchers would be worth 7-8 thousand dollars for each student. Today in Florida, some 170,000 students use them, including families at schools in the Archdiocese of Miami where 36 percent of its 35,000 students use the vouchers.
Democratic State Rep. Susan Valdes, who backed the measure after an amendment, says:
“These private schools should let the school district know how many potential seats they can lose and maybe they don’t because we recognize that 85% of Floridians choose the public system to educate their children.”
The representative explained to us that by knowing how many students would be interested in the vouchers, they could then calculate the total amount of funds. And therefore also calculate how much public schools would receive.