One rural Alabama school district is jumping on the chance to attract new students – and is charging them $7,000 apiece to attend public school.

Many schools across the state allow out-of-district students to attend, but restrictions apply and costs are typically a few hundred dollars. Lee County’s proposal stands out for its cost – and its promise that the state may pick up the tab for eligible students’ tuition.

Starting in 2025, some Alabama students will get education savings accounts, a school choice option created in 2024 through the CHOOSE Act. Families will get up to $7,000 per child for eligible educational expenses. According to the law, that could include expenses at public schools.

Superintendent Mike Howard said students outside the district want to enroll in Lee County, and expanded school choice options give his schools the opportunity to experiment.

“We will get two, three phone calls a week on average,” he said, “of [families] wanting to be a part of Lee County even though they don’t live in Lee County.”

Alabama’s law will send $100 million in tax revenue that otherwise would go to traditional public schools to education savings accounts. Families can spend them on tuition, textbooks and instructional materials. Alabama’s law requires public and private schools to opt into the program.

In states with ESAs, much of the money spent goes to private schools. Historically, in Alabama, most school choice money has gone to students in private schools.

But Howard sees ESAs as an opportunity to attract students to Lee County schools, which, like other rural Alabama school districts, has seen enrollment decline over the past decade.

Enrollment peaked in 2014 at 10,000 students in 2008, and has slowly declined since then. Last year, 8,900 students were enrolled in Lee County’s 14 schools.

“I told the board,” Howard said, “with the CHOOSE Act coming through, we have the potential to lose even more students.”

“So I want us to get ahead of this.”

The board voted in June to create an out-of-district enrollment policy, effective with the 2024-25 school year, that said students living outside of the district could attend Lee County schools and take online classes under the following conditions:

• The student is a rising sixth grade student or higher (enrollment this year is limited to students in grade six through 11),
• The family has to live within 50 miles of the board’s central office, which includes all of Tallapoosa, Chambers, Macon and Russell counties along with parts of Randolph, Clay, Coosa, Elmore, Montgomery, Bullock and Barbour counties.
• An application must be completed annually,
• The family must pay tuition of $7,000 each year,
• The student must take a placement test.

Tuition is set at $7,000, which is the maximum amount the state will pay under the CHOOSE Act. Of note: It isn’t clear whether public school districts will be able to collect both an ESA and regular state education funding. The rules for ESAs are currently under development.

What Lee County is doing – jumping into the school choice bucket – is happening in other states, too, Nathan Sanders told AL.com, though exactly how widespread the practice is is not clear.

Sanders, who directs policy and advocacy across the South for EdChoice, called Lee County’s plan “the perfect example” of how educational freedom improves school options in all sectors.

“It’s not just about private school choice. It’s not just about homeschool families and charter families,” Sanders said. “This is also about public school and the choices you could have there and how public schools can utilize these programs to help families.”

Alabama is still working on rules for its education savings account program. The first ESAs will be available at the start of the 2025-26 school year for families who earn less than 300% of the federal poverty level. The first 500 accounts are reserved for students with disabilities.

A spokesperson for the Alabama Department of Revenue, which is overseeing development and implementation, said they are still early in the process and pointed AL.com to a page on the department’s website where proposed rules will be posted for public comment.

Public schools also can choose to participate in the tax credit scholarship program available through the Alabama Accountability Act. Of the 3,500 students awarded tax credit scholarship programs last year, only 14 attended public schools. The remainder of students attended private schools.

Enrollment across county school systems, with the exception of a few, is declining, but Howard said he isn’t trying to take away other public school districts’ students. The 50-mile radius in the district’s policy includes all of Tallapoosa, Chambers, Macon and Russell counties along with parts of Randolph, Clay, Coosa, Elmore, Montgomery, Bullock and Barbour counties.

Howard said Lee County can offer students dual enrollment and college and career readiness opportunities. The district partners with two community colleges in the area: Chattahoochee Valley and Southern Union.

“We are 100% covering the cost to send these students to school,” he said. “We’re going to allow them the opportunity to go to Southern Union or earn a CCR credential – hopefully earn their associate’s degree even before they earn their high school diploma.”

Out-of-district students will take online, not in-person classes. They will be able to participate in in-person extracurricular activities like sports and band.

“They may not function well going eight hours a day in a classroom over and over,” Howard said, “and they may do better by having a part-time job supporting their family, but also have the opportunity to do work online through us.”

Even though they’re taking academic instruction online, he said, activities beyond academics are still within reach for those students. And students will have the opportunity to rank which high school they want to do extracurriculars at.

“[They’d] still be able to participate in prom and graduation and those types of things without the day-to-day grind of being in a set classroom for a certain period of time.”

“It gives us an opportunity to align these students with the school we feel will best meet their individual desires.”

At this point, he said, there are still a lot of details to be worked out and they’re not sure how many out-of-district students will enroll.

“Are we going to have 1,000 students who want to be a part,” he asked, “or two? We have no idea.”

Howard said that realistically, he expects a dozen or so out-of-district students will enroll.

“We’re piloting this to see if this is going to be a viable option for the CHOOSE Act moving forward,” Howard said.

“We are going to be, I guess, the guinea pigs to see if it works or not.”