{"id":37444,"date":"2025-02-14T08:35:22","date_gmt":"2025-02-14T14:35:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=37444"},"modified":"2025-02-14T08:35:22","modified_gmt":"2025-02-14T14:35:22","slug":"private-school-scholarships-sought-for-foster-youth-siblings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=37444","title":{"rendered":"Private school scholarships sought for foster youth, siblings"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Health and Human Services Committee heard testimony Feb. 12 on a bill that would provide state-funded scholarships for Nebraska foster youth and their siblings to attend private schools.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Beau Ballard<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Under LB481, introduced by Sen. Beau Ballard of Lincoln, the state Department of Health and Human Services would administer the program, which would be funded at $200,000 annually through the state\u2019s General Fund.<\/p>\n

Any youth in the state\u2019s foster care system, as well as their biological siblings, could qualify for a scholarship under the program. Scholarships could be used to pay all or part of the cost to educate a qualified student at a nongovernmental, privately operated elementary or secondary school that complies with certain antidiscrimination provisions.<\/p>\n

A qualified student would remain eligible for a scholarship until they graduate high school or reach age 21, regardless of their foster care status.<\/p>\n

Ballard said the bill would be a \u201cprudent investment\u201d in Nebraska\u2019s future and would provide continuity for young people who often experience significant educational setbacks due to changing schools frequently.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy intent for LB481 is fairly simple, it\u2019s to protect the social and educational development of foster care children and their siblings,\u201d Ballard said. \u201cMany of these children move from family to family, house to house, community to community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Foster parent Angela Pillow, who said she currently pays private school tuition for two foster youth in her care, testified in favor of LB481. Herself a foster child in her youth, Pillow said it\u2019s important to minimize disruptions for vulnerable state wards who already have lost so much.<\/p>\n

\u201cUnless you\u2019ve been there, I feel like no one really knows what it\u2019s like to be in foster care,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Also speaking in support was Carla Knipp, guidance counselor at Roncalli Catholic High School in Omaha. Eighty-five percent of Roncalli students receive some form of financial assistance from the school, she said, and the student body is both racially and socioeconomically diverse.<\/p>\n

Knipp said being a small school of 300 students allows Roncalli to provide a variety of levels of student support that public schools often lack, and the ability to be in regular conversation with parents.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that LB481 and the scholarships it would provide can make a positive impact on students across the state and students that we serve,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Daniel Russell of Stand for Schools testified in opposition to LB481. While the bill is limited to foster youth, he said, voucher programs often start small and expand over time.<\/p>\n

Russell also questioned whether DHHS possesses the expertise to administer a scholarship program and what he characterized as the bill\u2019s minimal reporting and accountability requirements.<\/p>\n

\u201cSchool voucher programs have not been shown to be effective in increasing academic outcomes for their users,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we\u2019re going to spend money on sending children to private schools, I think it behooves the Legislature to ask the question of whether or not those children are being better academically served.\u201d<\/p>\n

The committee took no immediate action on the proposal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Health and Human Services Committee heard testimony Feb. 12 on a bill that would provide state-funded scholarships for Nebraska foster youth and their siblings to attend private schools.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[274],"class_list":["post-37444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health-and-human-services","tag-sen-beau-ballard"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/LB481Ballard2-12-25a.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37444"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37446,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37444\/revisions\/37446"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}