Document Type

Report

Publication Date

12-1-2007

Abstract

On January 23, 2004, President Bush signed the DC School Choice Incentive Act into law. This landmark piece of legislation included $14 million in funding for what would become the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP). The OSP is the first federally-funded K-12 scholarship program in the country and was designed to provide approximately 1,700 children from low income families with tuition scholarships worth up to $7,500. The scholarships cover the costs of attending nonpublic schools within the District of Columbia that agreed to participate in the Program. In December of 2006, Congress amended the DC School Choice Incentive Act to increase the continuing eligibility requirements from 200 percent of poverty line to 300 percent for families already enrolled in the Program.2 As a pilot program, the OSP is authorized to operate for five years and is being implemented by the Washington Scholarship Fund (WSF).

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