Dive Brief:
- A federal district judge on Tuesday ordered Texas officials to make sure Islamic schools have access to apply for participation in the new state school choice program.
- The decision comes after two lawsuits filed by Muslim families and Islamic schools this month that claim state leaders intentionally sidelined Islamic school applications when rolling out the Texas Education Freedom Accounts program, one of the nation's largest state school choice initiatives.
- The judge issued a temporary restraining order on March 17 — the same day parent applications for the program were set to close — and extended the deadline by two weeks until March 31. The order also requires Texas leaders administering the program to allow Islamic schools to apply for it, and to receive and process those applications.
Dive Insight:
Texas’ $1 billion voucher rollout is one of the nation's largest state-level attempts at implementing a school choice program. The program was created through state law last year.
The state’s first application window for families opened Feb. 4, after schools applied on a rolling basis to be put on a list of schools eligible for students to attend with the program funding. Families can use the funds toward private school tuition and related costs such as enrollment fees, tutoring and uniforms.
Plaintiff Muslim families and Islamic schools contended in two lawsuits filed this month that although Islamic schools have applied and in some cases were approved, none ultimately made it to the preapproved list for families to choose from when applying for TEFA money. They said in court documents that hundreds of other private schools, including Christian schools, were approved.
"If you were to roll dice in a game of chance ... you would not come up with those numbers," U.S. District Judge Alfred Bennett said when issuing the March 17 temporary restraining order, according to the Houston Chronicle. "The appearance of this reeks."
The original complaint in one of the two consolidated lawsuits said the alleged decision to leave out Islamic schools came after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott designated the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the nation's largest Muslim civil rights organization, as a "terrorist” organization.
The complaint also cited Kelly Hancock, acting comptroller of public accounts for Texas, who suggested excluding school applicants with "Islamic" and alleged "foreign terrorist organization" ties from the voucher program.
“Recent findings have raised significant legal and taxpayer protection concerns,” Hancock wrote in a Dec. 12 letter to Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. In that letter, Hancock asked if schools would be legally disqualified from TEFA based on ties to a “foreign terrorist organization” and a “transnational criminal organization.”
Potential TEFA applicants, he said in a Dec. 12 letter to Paxton, were based at an address that hosted events organized by CAIR.
In accordance with the judge's Tuesday order, Hancock said in a statement that the program's deadline will be extended.
“This two-week extension will give families an additional opportunity to apply for the first year of school choice in Texas,” Hancock said. According to his count, more than 229,000 students have applied, and 2,200 schools have signed up to participate.
Imran Ghani, director of CAIR-Texas' Houston office, said in a Wednesday email to K-12 Dive that the court order Tuesday will ensure the state sends out applications for TEFA eligibility to Islamic schools, some of which will be receiving them for the first time.
“The lack of approved Islamic schools raises important questions about whether the program is being implemented in a fair, inclusive and nondiscriminatory manner," CAIR-Texas said in a statement Tuesday.
