The Peach State made history this week by opening applications for the new Georgia Promise Scholarship. Launched on March 1, the first application window runs until April 15.
This is Georgia’s first state-funded education savings account for K-12 students, empowering parents with direct control over a portion of state education funding. Families eager to participate can visit MyGeorgiaPromise.org to apply online. The Foundation previously explained the eligibility requirements and how the funds can be used.
The Promise Scholarship was created by lawmakers last year after a hard-fought battle at the Capitol. A similar proposal fell just short in 2023, but legislators persevered and passed the act in 2024. For Georgia families, this is a historic opportunity to seek an education that fits their individual needs.
This moment marks an exciting turning point in education reform for our state. Let’s take a look at how we got here.
The Georgia Promise Scholarship is an outgrowth of the broader idea of school choice, which has deep roots in American education policy, stemming from debates over how best to provide students with a quality education. While public schooling has been the dominant model in the U.S. since the 19th century, dissatisfaction with the one-size-fits-all approach led to alternative education movements as early as the mid-20th century.
To date, Georgia has offered school choice opportunities through charter schools and limited scholarship programs, but never before has our state provided such flexible options to so many students. Potentially hundreds of thousands of students are eligible—however, the program’s funding is initially limited to about 22,000 scholarships (1% of the state’s K-12 budget) and is limited to families whose children are zoned for the lowest performing public schools.
What has spurred the advancement of the school choice movement in Georgia and around the country? We talk about that in this week’s commentary. We also have the latest news and analysis from the last week, including:
- Lawmakers hit Crossover Day on Thursday
- Comprehensive school-safety bill clears Georgia House
- March is National Peanut Month
- Google joins Meta in abandoning fact checkers
Have a great weekend,
– Kyle Wingfield
Friday’s Freshest
Georgia landlords say they provide security, but still face legal peril
In Georgia, you can be held civilly liable if a criminal harms another person in your place of business and a court rules that you didn’t implement adequate measures for security. This was established by the Georgia Supreme Court when a shooting victim filed a case against CVS after being shot on their property. Nevertheless, three people who hold high-ranking positions in Georgia’s corporate real estate industry said that taking reasonable security measures on their property still isn’t enough to shield them from a costly lawsuit.
The push to rein in abusive lawsuits
In lawsuits and legislative debates alike, both sides get their say. And the plaintiff’s bar, now playing defense thanks to Gov. Brian Kemp’s push to rein in abusive lawsuits, is certainly making its case against reform. Plenty of good people work as plaintiff’s attorneys, trying to correct injustices. But let’s be honest: If all plaintiff’s lawyers were always committed to fair play, we wouldn’t be having this debate.
Tort reform advances. What’s next?
Gov. Brian Kemp’s push to curb abusive lawsuits cleared a significant hurdle. The state Senate approved a comprehensive reform bill on a mostly party-line vote (one Republican voted against it, and one Democrat for it). Along the way, opponents lodged a spate of wrong-headed objections. What were they?
Georgia’s legislative push for regulatory reform
A central problem with regulations is that they tend to grow perpetually absent deliberate efforts to review them. This buildup creates a burden for workers and established businesses and raises the barrier to entry for potential startups. Some states have taken steps in recent years to combat the inertia of regulatory expansion.
How much does each school district have in reserves?
Across Georgia, public school districts are refusing to go along with a reduction in property taxes that was approved by voters last fall – all while raking in taxpayer dollars like never before. Cumulatively, Georgia’s 180 city and county school districts have more than doubled their reserves to a staggering $6.5 billion.
The Latest
Economy
March is National Peanut Month, and Georgia leads the way in farming them
Peanuts are a $2 billion industry in Georgia, according to the Georgia Peanut Commission, making it the place to be for National Peanut Month in March. Georgia farmers produced 50% of the peanuts grown in the United States in 2024 on 845,000 acres in 2024, yielding on average 3,800 pounds per acre.
Sharks ‘smell blood’ in Atlanta’s office market as distress mounts
When Thomas Taylor looks at Atlanta’s skyline, he sees a quarter of its office buildings underwater. The city’s towers, of course, stand well above sea level. But Taylor’s job as the senior research manager for data firm Trepp is to assess their financial stability — and many borrowers are,in industry terms, “underwater,” meaning they owe more than their buildings are worth.
White House requires federal agencies to disclose time spent working for unions instead of taxpayers
The Trump administration has restored reporting and transparency requirements for so-called “official time,” the practice where government workers are allowed to act exclusively on behalf of their unions while still being paid by taxpayers. The Biden administration had attempted to hide the practice from public view, first by stopping the reports on it and later by scrubbing historic information about the practice from government websites.
Education
Comprehensive school-safety bill clears Georgia House
A comprehensive school-safety bill prompted by last year’s school shooting in Barrow County passed the Georgia House of Representatives overwhelmingly this week. House Bill 268, which cleared the House 159-13, is a top priority for House Speaker Jon Burns. Its chief sponsor is Rep. Holt Persinger, R-Winder, whose district includes Apalachee High School, where two teachers and two students were shot to death last September.
Georgia House advances bill to ban cellphones in K-8 classrooms statewide
The Georgia House on Tuesday passed a bill that would prohibit K-8 students across the state from accessing their personal electronic devices during school hours. The proposed ban would include smartphones, smartwatches, tablets and headphones. This comes as a number of schools in metro Atlanta are already testing out cellphone bans.
Education Savings Accounts would give military families freedom they deserve
Military families exemplify the best of America—sacrifice, service and dedication to our nation’s security. Yet, too often, their children are shortchanged by an education system that fails to meet their needs. It’s time to empower military families with true education freedom through education savings accounts.
Wyoming latest state to adopt universal school choice
Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon signed a universal school choice bill — substantially expanding on 2024 legislation that created an education savings account program. The Steamboat Legacy Scholarship Act will annually provide $7,000 for students in non-public schools to be used for tuition or tutoring. The bill is worded to go into effect immediately so students can apply for the program for the 2025-2026 school year.
Government accountability
Georgia wildfires blaze through 4,000 acres of land across state
Wildfires engulfed thousands of acres of land in North Georgia over the weekend. The Georgia Forestry Commission (GFC) said they responded to 86 wildfires that burned over 1,550 acres of land. GFC responded to another 137 wildfires that burned nearly 2,400 acres. The National Weather Service issued a red flag warning across North and Central Georgia last weekend due to dry and windy conditions.
DOGE’s first cut at bureaucracy: A target inventory
Donald Trump’s Executive Order, “Ensuring Lawful Governance and Implementing the President’s ‘Department of Government Efficiency’ Regulatory Initiative,” has set the stage for a major regulatory rollback—even invoking “deconstruction.” This directive, which formalizes Elon Musk’s “DOGE Team Leads” at agencies, aims at cutting unconstitutional and burdensome regulations while prioritizing efficiency and economic growth.
Lawmakers are considering multi-million-dollar upgrade to Georgia’s aging 911 infrastructure
When Georgia’s 911 system was built, most people still used landlines. Today, calls for help made in the case of emergencies still rely on that decades-old system. That’s why lawmakers in the state House are moving forward with a proposal to overhaul Georgia’s old infrastructure for updated technology.
Housing
Local HBA wins impact fee case
A judge ruled in favor of the Greater Atlanta Home Builders Association and its members regarding the improper increase of impact fees in 2022 and 2024 in Henry County after the county did not take the appropriate steps to update its impact fees in accordance with the Georgia Development Impact Fee Act. All fees are to be repaid by Henry County to the feepayer.
Tariffs could play a significant role in an already shaky housing market
President Donald Trump’s tariffs have caused a rise in lumber prices, which homebuilders have warned will increase construction costs and translate into more expensive housing for U.S. consumers. Lumber prices hit their highest level in two-and-a-half years this week, and lumber futures are up more than 14% for the year to date as of Wednesday amid the worries over tariffs.
Bonus
Are cage-free laws to blame for high egg prices?
America’s current spike in egg prices has quickly become one of the central public policy issues of early 2025. But while the emphasis in much of the media and amongst policymakers has focused on the epidemiology patterns of the avian flu, the government itself also bears much of the responsibility for our current national egg panic.
How tech created the online fact-checking industry
Earlier this year, Meta pulled the plug on its US fact-checking program. Google now refuses to add fact-checks to Search and YouTube. Nearly a decade of work — hundreds of millions of dollars spent, thousands of people hired — is gone, essentially overnight, and for good reason. This fact-checking regime was not about truth. Instead, it evolved into a desperate stopgap and PR tactic that was doomed from the start.
Disney lays off nearly 200 employees with ABC News severely impacted
Disney’s ABC News Group and Disney Entertainment Networks will lay off just under 200 employees. The cuts represent nearly 6% of the total ABC News Group and Disney Entertainment Networks workforce. The majority of the impacted staffers are from ABC News, according to a source with knowledge of the headcount reduction.
Quotes of Note
“Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” – Thomas Jefferson
“Whether you believe you can do a thing or not, you are right.” – Henry Ford
“The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer.” – Will Rogers
