House Education Committee Votes to Cut Scholarships, Leaves 30,000 Students Stranded 

Harrisburg, Pa., June 16, 2026 — Today, the Pennsylvania House Education Committee rushed passage of HB 2632 on a party line vote. The bill is an attack on students’ access to educational opportunities.  

The voting meeting was scheduled at the call of the chair, a move which bypasses the normal 24-hour transparency notice.  

• HB 2632 would immediately cut credits for scholarship organizations, reducing funding for scholarships by $102 million over two years. This would take away scholarships from 30,000 current students.  
• Starting in 2027, EITC and OSTC would be eliminated and replaced with a new program, the “Education Options Tax Credit.”  
• The bill would require onerous new regulations on every private school, and require the Auditor General to do audits for private schools, but not public schools. 
• The bill would impose a 2% tax on scholarship organizations to fund government agencies. 

Nearly 70,000 students were turned away due to program caps to the EITC and OSTC programs in the 2023-24 school year. Expansion, not reduction, of these programs, and opting into new programs like the federal scholarship tax credit, are needed to serve the demand from students to access an alternative school of their choice.  

In addition, the committee advanced HB 2634, to cut public charter schools by an estimated $500 million. 

President & CEO of the Commonwealth Foundation, Andrew Lewis, issued the following statement in response: 

“House Democrats have passed an education poison pill, preparing to rip away transformative school choice from tens of thousands of students. The cuts proposed in this bill are punitive and destructive. 

“By reducing available scholarships, restricting student eligibility, burdening schools and scholarship organizations with new mandates, and discouraging donor participation, this proposal would extinguish the success of the EITC and OSTC programs, which have served over 1 million students since its creation. 

“This vote comes as over 200,000 students finished another school year stuck in a failing school. Scholarship programs are often the only way for struggling, low-income students to access a school that best serves their needs. 

“Lawmakers must reject efforts to take educational opportunity away from the Pennsylvania students who need it most. We must protect educational opportunity, not cut it.” 

For media inquiries, please contact Giana DePaul at gmd@commonwealthfoundation.org or (215) 859-0384.