Texas opens a public window on its new education savings accounts

Texans can now track how the state’s new education savings account program is being used. Texas Comptroller Don Huffines on Oct. 29 launched the first phase of a public dashboard for Texas Education Freedom Accounts (TEFA), the program lawmakers created in 2025 with Senate Bill 2.

The launch came three days after Huffines announced that his office is working to secure an independent, third-party auditor to review the program. That audit will be in addition to the regular audit the State Auditor’s Office is already performing, which the comptroller said gives TEFA “three distinct layers of review” alongside the agency’s own internal oversight.

Why it matters

The program is in its first year, and the comptroller’s office calls it the largest day-one school choice initiative in the nation. The program received approximately 274,000 applications, and more than 248,000 students were found eligible, according to the comptroller’s participant demographic report, which reflects data as of Oct. 1. The program had funded 116,574 accounts, and more than 95,000 students were on the year-one waiting list, which the report calls the largest school choice waiting list in the nation.

That gap between eligibility and access is likely to shape the debate when the 90th Legislature meets. The report says the agency will keep publishing updates as numbers change before that session.

What the public can see

The comptroller’s office says the new dashboard page starts with initial program metrics and will grow “in the coming weeks” into a full, searchable dashboard. The Oct. 26 announcement listed data points the office plans to add, including applications received, eligible applicants, funded participants, the year-one waiting list, students with disabilities, participation by priority tier, income distribution, a school district participation heat map and the program’s impact on public school enrollment.

To protect student privacy, the office says it will not report exact counts for any category with fewer than 10 participating students. Those figures will be shown as “fewer than 10,” rounded or combined with other categories. The page also links to the comptroller’s whistleblower portal, where people can report suspected fraud, anonymously if they choose.

Who is getting the accounts

State law sets priority tiers for the program’s first year. Students with disabilities in households at or below 500% of the federal poverty level come first, followed by students in households at or below 200%, then households between 200% and 500%, and finally those above 500%, according to the program’s FAQ.

The Oct. 1 report shows how that ordering played out. About 72,500 funded students came from households at or below 200% of the poverty level, and about 43,900 from households between 201% and 500%. Fewer than 30 students from households above 500% were funded, even though 67,002 such students were eligible. The report says those few were funded along with siblings in a different income tier. More than 18% of participating students have a qualifying disability.

How much families receive

For 2026-27, a student attending a participating private school receives $10,474, a student with a disability at a participating private school may receive up to $30,000 based on their IEP, and a homeschooled student receives $2,000, according to the TEFA program site. Private school awards are paid in installments, with the final 50% due Feb. 1, 2027.

What’s next

The application window for 2026-27 closed March 31, and the TEFA site does not yet list application dates for 2027-28. Families can join an interest list on the TEFA site. The fuller searchable dashboard is expected in the coming weeks, and the results of the independent audit had not been announced as of Nov. 4.