{"id":259883,"date":"2026-08-05T20:42:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T20:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/259883\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T20:42:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T20:42:12","slug":"pa-senators-support-empowering-parents-with-federal-scholarship-tax-credit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/259883\/","title":{"rendered":"PA Senators Support Empowering Parents with Federal Scholarship Tax Credit"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\"Education,\t\t<\/p>\n

HARRISBURG \u2013 A bipartisan group of state senators is working to ensure Pennsylvania benefits from a new federal tax credit program which could help empower parents and create new learning opportunities for students.<\/p>\n

Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward (R-39)<\/a>,\u00a0Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman (R-41)<\/a>,\u00a0Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Scott Martin (R-13)<\/a>, Senate Education Committee Chair Lynda Schlegel Culver (R-27)<\/a>, Sen. Judy Ward (R-30)<\/a> and Sen. Anthony Williams (D-8)<\/a> announced today they plan to introduce legislation<\/a> that would ensure Pennsylvania families can benefit from the Federal Scholarship Tax Credit, which was created by the U.S. Congress last year to support both public and private schools.<\/p>\n

The program would allow taxpayers to earn up to $1,700 in tax credits for contributions to non-profit Scholarship Granting Organizations. These organizations could use the funds to provide scholarships for education-related services at private or public schools, including tuition, fees, academic tutoring, special education services, technology services and classroom supplies.<\/p>\n

For students and families to be eligible for scholarships, a state must opt in with either an order signed by its governor or a law passed by the state legislature by Jan. 1, 2027. If a state does not opt in, taxpayers in that state will still be eligible for the tax credit, but the money will fund scholarships in other states.<\/p>\n

According to the Internal Revenue Service, 30 states across the U.S. have already opted into the program.<\/p>\n

A recent report<\/a> estimates the tax credit will generate an additional $24 billion nationwide in education funding annually. Failing to opt in would mean Pennsylvania students could miss out on hundreds of millions<\/a> of dollars in education funding annually, the senators said.<\/p>\n

Initial guidance<\/a> on the program was released by the federal government in June, and the IRS expects that full regulations will be issued in September.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

CONTACT: Erica Clayton Wright<\/a>\u00a0(Sen. K. Ward)
CONTACT: Kate Flessner<\/a>\u00a0(Sen. Pittman)
CONTACT: Jason Thompson<\/a>\u00a0(Sen. Martin)\u00a0
CONTACT:\u00a0Sam Clepper<\/a> (Sen. Culver)
CONTACT: Matt Deegan<\/a> (Sen. J. Ward)
CONTACT: Sabrina Hall<\/a> (Sen. Williams)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HARRISBURG \u2013 A bipartisan group of state senators is working to ensure Pennsylvania benefits from a new federal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":259884,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-259883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=259883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/259883\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/259884"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=259883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=259883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=259883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}