Students outside of the Westford School in April 2025. File photo by Glenn Russell/VTDigger Vermont may soon opt into a federal school choice tax credit program that would allow parents to make tax deductible payments toward private school tuition and possibly public school programs. The prog ram, and whether to opt in, was a quiet point of contention this legislation session. But news that the Trump administration may allow the tax credit dollars to flow to public afterschool and summer school programs has eased some doubters’ concerns.  Still, some remain skeptical about whether the Trump administration will stick to that commitment. Others predict there may be significant caveats in the guidelines set to be released in September. Sen. Ruth Hardy, D-Addison, who along with colleagues in the Senate Finance Committee helped shape the contours of the state’s guidelines for the program, said it was “positive news” that administration officials are leaning toward allowing funding to go towards public school programs but noted she was still “extremely skeptical.” “Until we see the final guidelines that they come up with, I wouldn’t want to write home about it,” she said. The school-choice program, dubbed the Education Freedom Tax Credit, was established under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and creates a first-of-its-kind tax-subsidized voucher program for private schools. The program works by offering federal taxpayers a one-for-one tax credit of up to $1,700 for contributions to eligible education organizations. Families making up to 300% of local median income, or roughly $250,000 in Vermont, would be eligible for the program. Billions of federal tax dollars are expected to go towards education programs because of the law. Vermont legislators haggled this session over whether those tax credits could be steered towards public schools. It was an under-the-radar issue, as House and Senate lawmakers negotiated over the parameters of the program — and whether to opt in at all. Separate legislation in the House would have opted the state out of the program. Other iterations of regulations on the program would have made the Legislature the authority to opt in or out of the program rather than the governor. But lawmakers eventually landed on guidelines written into H.933, now Act 164, that Gov. Phil Scott signed this month. The law gives Scott authority to determine which Vermont educational organizations would be eligible to receive the tax-deductible contributions, as long as they fit within future federal guidelines. Legislators also created a number of state-level guidelines and guardrails around which organizations could qualify, including organizations “with the core mission” of providing opportunities to economically underprivileged students. The law says that eligible organizations cannot discriminate against students because of their religion, national origin, sexual orientation or place of birth, among other criteria. Sen. Thomas Chittenden, D-Chittenden Southeast, who also helped shape Vermont’s law, noted that the Legislature has “every right to pull out of this in the years to come” if future guidelines aren’t up to their standard. But during testimony and in separate interviews, he said he didn’t want to “shut the door” on the program altogether. Vermonters would still be able to utilize the tax credit if the state opted out of the program, but they’d just spend it on out of state educational organizations, he said. “What it would do is just force the $1,700 to go to any other state, and there will be states that approve this,” he said. “That would be inconsistent and indefensible for me to say to my constituents that ‘Yes, you can pay or contribute $1,700 to a school, but just not in Vermont.’” In a statement, Scott said his team is awaiting further guidance from the U.S. Treasury Department before making a final decision to opt in.  But like Chittenden, Scott noted that the tax credit would be available for taxpayers, regardless of whether that money flows to Vermont programs. “So at this time, we fully intend to, in an effort to make sure Vermont students can benefit from it,” he said. He agreed with legislators that the program “has the opportunity to expand access to after school opportunities, tutoring, literacy initiatives, as well as summer programming for some students who otherwise may not have been able to afford these options.” Despite indications the federal government will allow public school programs to receive the funds, some public school proponents remain concerned that the program won’t actually benefit public school students. Nothing is certain until the Treasury Department issues its official regulations. “Ultimately, I’m pretty skeptical,” Hardy said. “But I heard my colleagues say,  ‘This could be beneficial, and let’s try to make it useful,’ and so I did my best to contribute to that conversation.” She noted that the future of the program also depends on Scott’s decision. He will be the sole authority in the state to decide which organizations are eligible once federal guidelines are released. Others are even more wary. Ken Fredette, a board member with the Vermont nonprofit group Friends of Public Education, panned the program in testimony this session and in an interview. “When they say, ‘Oh, public schools will be able to participate in this,’ I’m trying to look for a word that’s more printable than ‘bullshit,’” he said. “But that’s what it is.” He also took issue with lawmakers removing language that would have given them authority over whether to opt into the program. He said he has “a big problem” with empowering the governor with even more power, “because it should be a legislative process.” He added that the tax credit structure amounts to a “siphoning of billions of U.S. tax dollars out of federal coffers” and a “depleting of resources available for public schools.” For now, Vermont officials await the federal government’s guidelines. “I think it has the potential to be beneficial,” Hardy said. “What I don’t want to see is to have all the money go to private school programs.” Read the story on VTDigger here: Vermont’s public schools could benefit from a new federal school choice tax credit program, but skeptics abound. ...read more read less