EdChoice scholarship deadline approaches

More than two dozen area private schools are accepting voucher enrollments.

YOUNGSTOWN — The deadline to apply for Ohio’s EdChoice Scholarship for the 2008-09 school year is less than one week away.

Friday is the cutoff point for parents to apply for the school voucher program that allows children enrolled in academically troubled schools to seek state tuition assistance to attend a private school.

The scholarship is worth up to $5,150 per year for high school students and up to $4,375 for children in kindergarten through the eighth grade and can be renewed through high school graduation.

Only children attending public schools that have been placed in state-designated academic watch or academic emergency on the state report card for two of the last three years are eligible to apply.

The only area schools on that list are Alpha, Athena, East, Hayes, Odyssey, Berry, Taft, Volney Rogers and Williamson in Youngstown; Washington Alternative School in Warren; and Westgate in East Liverpool. Any child attending a charter school who would otherwise be assigned to one of the schools on that list as well as children who aren’t in one of those schools now but would be assigned to one of them next school year, can also apply.

Children in private schools and home-schooled children aren’t eligible.

Applicants must first approach a private school of their choosing and be accepted for enrollment in that school before applying for a voucher.

The private school assists in the application process.

The state has 14,000 scholarships available and only about 7,000 children took advantage of the program this school year.