2023 South Carolina Code of Laws › Title 59 - Education › Chapter 8 - Education Scholarship Trust Fund › Section 59-8-150. Requirements for education service providers, department, and Education Oversight Committee.

(A) To ensure equitable treatment and personal safety of all scholarship students, all education service providers shall:
(1) comply with all applicable health and safety laws or codes;
(2) hold a valid occupancy permit if required by the municipality in which the education service provider is located;
(3) not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, color, or national origin. This item shall not be interpreted to preclude any independent or religious educational provider from exercising an exemption allowed under federal law; and
(4) conduct criminal background checks on employees and exclude from employment anyone who:
(a) is not permitted by state law to work in a school;
(b) reasonably might pose a threat to the safety of students; or
(c) is listed on federal, state, or other central child abuse registries.
(B) To ensure that funds are spent appropriately, all education service providers shall:
(1) provide parents with a receipt for all qualifying expenses; and
(2) demonstrate their financial viability by filing a surety bond with the department prior to the start of the school year if they are to receive fifty thousand dollars or more during the school year.
(C) In order to allow parents and the public to measure the achievements of the program, academic progress must be documented annually for each scholarship student. Students with an Individualized Education Plan that cannot be accommodated with standardized testing are excluded from the requirements of item (1). Education service providers that provide academic instruction must monitor the progress of students with significant cognitive disabilities through alternative assessments including portfolios.
(1) Education service providers that provide full-time academic instruction shall:
(a) ensure that each scholarship student in grades three through eight takes the SC Ready or SC Ready alternative summative assessment required of students in public schools in this State;
(b) ensure that each scholarship student in grades four and six takes the SC Pass or SC Pass alternative summative assessment required of students in public schools in this State;
(c) in lieu of the assessments required by subitems (a) and (b), ensure that each scholarship recipient in grades three through eight takes a nationally norm-referenced formative assessment at the beginning of the school year, at the end of the first semester, and at the end of the school year. The assessment must be approved by the department, aligned with state standards, and include a linking study;
(d) ensure that each scholarship student in grades nine through twelve takes a nationally norm-referenced or formative assessment approved by the department. Students with disabilities for whom standardized testing is not appropriate are exempt from this requirement;
(e) collect high school graduation information of scholarship students for reporting to the department as required in this section; and
(f) ensure that the parent or guardian of a scholarship student taking the assessments above receives a written report of the student's performance on each assessment. The report must include the student's score on the assessment and an indication of how the student's assessment performance compares to other South Carolina students.
The department may promulgate regulations to carry out the requirements of this subsection.
(2) The department shall ensure that the education service provider has access to and is trained in administering the state assessments required in subitems (1)(a) and (b). The department shall assume any costs associated with training, administering, or taking assessments with no charges to the provider or ESTF students.
(3) For the purpose of evaluating program effectiveness, education service providers that provide full-time academic instruction shall ensure that results in item (1) are:
(a) provided to the parent of a scholarship student and must be provided to the department on an annual basis, beginning with the first year of program implementation; and
(b) disaggregated by grade level, gender, family income level, race, and English learner status.
(4) The department, or the appropriate organization chosen by the department, if any, must be informed of the scholarship student's graduation from high school.
(D) The department shall:
(1) comply with all student privacy laws;
(2) collect all test results;
(3) annually provide individual student assessment results and information to the Education Oversight Committee. The transmission of the information must be made in a manner that safeguards the data to ensure student privacy.
(E) The Education Oversight Committee shall:
(1) comply with all student privacy laws;
(2) report on and publish associated learning gains and graduation rates to the public by means of a state website with data aggregated by grade level, gender, family income level, number of years participating in the program, and race and a report for any participating school if at least fifty-one percent of the total enrolled students in the private school participated in the ESTF program in the prior school year or if there are at least thirty participating students who have scores for tests administered. If the Education Oversight Committee determines that the thirty participating-student cell size may be reduced without disclosing the personally identifiable information of a participating student, the Education Oversight Committee may reduce the participating-student cell size, but the cell size may not be reduced to fewer than ten participating students;
(3) evaluate and report the academic performance of scholarship students compared to similar public school populations; and
(4) collaborate with the department to develop and administer an annual parental satisfaction survey for all parents of scholarship students on issues relevant to the ESTF program, to include effectiveness and length of the program participation. Results of this survey must be provided to the General Assembly by December thirty-first of each year.
(F) An education service provider, not a public school, is autonomous and not an agent of the state or federal government, therefore:
(1) the department or any other state agency may not regulate the educational program of an approved education provider that accepts funds from an account;
(2) the creation of the program does not expand the regulatory authority of the State, its officers, or a school district to impose regulation of education service providers beyond those necessary to enforce the requirements of the program;
(3) the freedom of education service providers to provide for the educational needs of scholarship students without governmental control must not be abridged;
(4) an education service provider that accepts payment by a parent from an ESTF account pursuant to this chapter is not an agent of the state or federal government; and
(5) education service providers shall not be required to alter their creeds, practices, admissions policy, or curriculum in order to accept payments by a parent from an ESTF account.
(G) A person paid by, contracted with, employed by, or having a financial interest in an education service provider shall not be allowed to serve on the board of an organization contracting for services with the department as defined in Section 59-8-115(J), serve on the board of a vendor or private management firm contracted to manage accounts as defined in Section 59-8-125(C), on the board of any other provider of contracted-for services under Section 59-8-110(12) or under Section 59-8-120(H), or on the ESTF Review Panel. Any education service provider violating this subsection shall be barred from participating in the program for two years and shall return any funds received under the program to the ESTF.
(H) A person serving as a board member or director of an education service provider shall have a fiduciary duty to the provider and shall avoid any conflicts of interest with the provider.
(I) No member of the General Assembly or their immediate family, as defined by Section 8-13-100(18), may have a financial interest in an education service provider. This does not prevent a member or their immediate family from qualifying under the provisions of this chapter to participate in the ESTF program.
(J) A person shall not serve in a position of leadership with an education service provider who has been convicted of a financial crime.
HISTORY: 2023 Act No. 8 (S.39), Section 1, eff June 3, 2023.
Editor's Note
2023 Act No. 8, Section 3, provides as follows:
"SECTION 3. This act takes effect thirty days after approval by the Governor, provided that upon approval of this act by the Governor, the Department of Education shall begin undertaking and executing responsibilities incidental to the implementation of this act so that the provisions of this act may be fully implemented thirty days after approval by the Governor."