Sponsor
Charles Roy
Representative · R-TX
Representative · R-TX
The bill expands parental choice and portability of IDEA funding—allowing support to follow children into private or home settings and providing flexible ESAs—while shifting dollars and oversight away from public schools, creating risks of underfunding, weakened protections for students in nonpublic settings, and added administrative burdens.
Eligible children with disabilities can have their IDEA funding follow them into whichever public, private, or home school they attend, expanding direct access to services across settings.
Parents of eligible children can receive state education savings account (ESA) distributions to pay for tuition, therapies, and other listed services, giving families more flexible financial support and choice.
Public school allocations are based on counts of eligible children, making funding more closely tied to the number of students needing special education services in each LEA and school.
Students who remain in public schools could face reduced IDEA funding as dollars follow eligible students to private or home settings, shrinking resources for public LEAs and remaining students with disabilities.
Providing ESAs and allowing services outside public schools may weaken oversight and reduce guaranteed IDEA protections and services for students in nonpublic settings.
States and local education agencies will incur new administrative burdens and costs to collect parental notifications, count eligible children, and implement ESA mechanisms.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Requires the federal IDEA share to follow each eligible child to the public, private, or home school they attend and allows direct ESA payments for private/home‑schooled eligible children, subject to State law.
Official title: To allow Federal funds appropriated for kindergarten through grade 12 education to follow the student.
Introduced March 21, 2025 by Charles Roy · Last progress March 21, 2025
Requires states to allocate federal IDEA funds so the federal share “follows” each eligible child to the public school, private school, or home school the child attends, including via direct education savings account payments for private/home‑schooled eligible children, and directs distribution to local education agencies and accounts based on annual parental enrollment notifications and headcounts. A non‑operative insertion into the Elementary and Secondary Education Act is included but contains no text and has no effect.