Inside the plan to move charter schools into public buildings
Months ago, when Florida’s Schools of Hope law was enacted, it set off a frenzy.
Sarasota County Public Schools quickly drafted a plan to close its district headquarters and raze and consolidate some schools. Manatee County Public Schools said the new law would cost the district an additional $2,500 per student who joined a Schools of Hope charter; Duval County Public Schools attempted to reject the charter school co-location request altogether.
Florida’s “Schools of Hope” law allows certain authorized charter operators to move into existing public schools with unused space, regardless of academic performance. The school district then foots the bill for the charter operator, continuing to pay for utilities, busing, custodial services and even student meals.
Florida has long been seen as a leader in the school choice movement, grabbing attention as a case study for what could come to be elsewhere. Throughout Schools of Hope’s rollout, educators and policy wonks across the country have been keeping tabs, wondering what this could mean for other states.
The answer, experts told Straight Arrow News, is complicated.
How did Schools of Hope become law?
While the initial proposal for the Schools of Hope law was dismissed by the Florida Legislature in June 2025, its language was quietly tucked into an 11th hour budget bill, which passed later in the year.
Its supporters say it continues to expand school choice options; critics warn it further strains cash-strapped public school systems.
This is not the first time Florida has experimented with expanding school choice. The state is home to the nation’s largest school voucher program, known as a universal education savings account, and over 400,000 Florida children now use public dollars to pay for some form of private schooling, according to The New York Times.
Florida isn’t alone. Other Republican-leaning states continue to expand access to charters and private school vouchers, and, in July, President Trump signed into law the first national voucher program, funded by a federal tax credit.
Todd Ziebarth, the chief of state policy and advocacy for the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools, said Schools of Hope could be an opportunity to make taxpayer dollars more efficient with a better use of school district buildings and resources.
“In some places, it could be viewed as a win-win,” he said. “Charters get access to space taxpayers have already paid for, so we’re not spending new taxpayer money on facilities.”
Though, Ziebarth cautioned that the “proof will be in the pudding” with Schools of Hope’s implementation. He said it’s one thing to write a policy and it’s another to implement one and see how it ages over three to five years.
Matthew S. McCluskey, assistant professor of educational leadership and policy studies at the University of Vermont, said there is a “rich history” of education policy diffusing across state lines — including with charter schools and finance policies. McCluskey told SAN he wouldn’t be surprised if similar legislation finds its way into other states and that districts are likely taking steps to secure a position in the “public school marketplace.”
Is Florida’s model a warning or a blueprint?
“I use that word ‘marketplace’ really intentionally,” he said. “Public schools haven’t had to compete in the marketplace because they had such a firm footing, and that footing seems to have become increasingly destabilized in our current political economy. And I think that we are seeing traditional public schools increasingly trying to compete in a market.”
However, McCluskey, who specializes in studying and researching charters, said Schools of Hope is not widely known — possibly because the legislation has yet to be truly tested, or because people don’t yet fully understand the potential financial incentive for charter operators. Schools of Hope schools won’t open until the fall of 2026.
Derek Black, a professor of law at the University of South Carolina who studies education policy, has a different theory.
He said that Florida is “addicted to choice.” Aside from charter authorizers, who have a financial stake in the game, Black suspects most lawmakers would steer away from a policy like Schools of Hope because charter schools have failed in other states.
“I think a lot of states are kind of waking up to that and they’ve seen all these problems and some of them are trying to clean up those messes,” he said.
Families and school districts flooded the state education department with concerns after Schools of Hope was announced. With mounting pressure and bills filed in the state legislature to modify or repeal the law, the state department proposed its own changes.
The new proposal attempts to address concerns over who must cover additional costs and how many applications approved charter school operators can submit, according to the Tampa Bay Times. It will be voted on at the end of February.
Schools of Hope is another notch in Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ belt as he works to revamp education, a top priority of his. His policies include reviews of classroom reading materials and restrictions on how sexuality and race can be discussed with students.
The governor has also worked to increase school choice by funneling tax dollars to private schools. In his final State of the State speech in December, DeSantis touted his accomplishments of expanding school choice options — something Schools of Hope will help push even further.
Can school districts survive the ‘inflection point’?
Many Florida schools have plenty of open space. In an October report co-published by the Florida Charter Institute and Momentum Strategy & Research, researchers found that “in the 2024-25 school year, over 645,000 seats were available in underutilized district buildings.”
Ziebarth told SAN he is optimistic.
“That could be game changing, right?” he said. “If Florida, given the size of the state, given the size of the charter sector, there can get to a place where this facility question is kind of worked out in a collaborative way, and all sides are kind of seeing like they’re getting wins out of it, that’s game changing.”
Andrew Spar, president of the Florida Education Association, said the state is at an “inflection point” where officials either decide to give public schools the tools and investment needed or not. He told SAN he has heard from leaders in other states who are nervous about similar policies like Schools of Hope coming to their area.
“They were like, ‘Can you just keep what you’re doing in Florida in Florida? Please stop sharing it with the rest of the nation,’” he said.
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Ella Rae Greene, Editor In Chief
