Vermont Town Tuitioning and Homeschool: What the School Choice System Covers

Vermont has operated one of the oldest school choice programs in the country for over 150 years. The system — known as town tuitioning — allows municipalities that don't operate their own public school to pay for students to attend other approved schools, public or private. If you're a Vermont homeschool family wondering whether this program can help cover your educational costs, the direct answer is: no, it can't. Home study is explicitly excluded.

But understanding how the system works — and why it works the way it does — is useful context for any Vermont family navigating education decisions.

How Vermont Town Tuitioning Works

Vermont's tuitioning system exists because of the state's geography and history. Many Vermont towns are too small to operate their own schools, particularly at the high school level. Rather than forcing all students to attend a single regional school, the state developed a system where towns pay tuition for their students to attend whatever approved school the family chooses.

The mechanics:

1. A student lives in a tuitioning town — a town that doesn't operate its own school at that grade level
2. The family selects an approved public or private school
3. The town pays the student's tuition, up to the state's per-pupil expenditure cap
4. If the school's tuition exceeds the cap, the family pays the difference

High school tuitioning: Approximately 90 Vermont towns participate in high school tuitioning. Students in these towns can attend any Vermont public school free of charge, or any approved independent school with the town's tuition payment covering up to the state cap.

Elementary tuitioning: A smaller number of towns participate in elementary tuitioning — towns without an elementary school. The same basic structure applies.

The cap: The state sets the tuitioning payment cap annually. As of recent years, the high school cap is approximately $19,000-$20,000 per student. Public schools must accept tuitioning students at their published tuition rates; independent schools can charge above the cap with families paying the difference.

Which Schools Are Approved for Tuitioning

Only "approved" schools are eligible for tuitioning funds. This is where it gets complicated.

Public schools: All Vermont public schools are eligible. Students in tuitioning towns can attend any Vermont public school — the local regional high school, a school in a neighboring district, or a school anywhere in the state — with the town paying the tuition.

Approved independent schools: Vermont private/independent schools approved by the Agency of Education are eligible for tuitioning if they meet specific criteria. The school must be nonsectarian under Vermont law as amended by Act 73 in 2022. This followed a U.S. Supreme Court decision (Carson v. Makin, 2022) that initially seemed to open religious schools to tuitioning funds, but Vermont's Legislature responded with Act 73 restricting tuitioning to nonsectarian schools. This is under ongoing legal challenge as of 2025.

What's excluded:

• Home study / home education
• Out-of-state schools (generally)
• Unapproved programs
• Religious schools (currently under Act 73 restrictions, subject to litigation)

Why Home Study Is Excluded

Vermont law has never included home study in the tuitioning framework. The reasons are partly historical (tuitioning predates the modern home education movement) and partly definitional (tuitioning is framed as paying for a school, not for a family's educational choice).

Vermont's home study statute (16 V.S.A. § 166b) is entirely separate from the tuitioning framework. A family registered for home study is not eligible for tuitioning payments. There is no mechanism — legislative or administrative — to access tuitioning funds for home education costs.

Vermont also doesn't have an Education Savings Account (ESA) program, unlike states like Arizona, Florida, or New Hampshire. ESAs provide government funds directly to families for a range of educational expenses including homeschooling. Vermont has not enacted ESA legislation as of 2025. Legislative proposals have been introduced but not passed.

This is a meaningful contrast with neighboring New Hampshire, which passed an ESA program (Education Freedom Accounts) in 2021 that allows families to use state per-pupil funds for homeschool, private school, or other education expenses.

What Tuitioning Means for Families Moving to Vermont

If you're relocating to Vermont and evaluating education options, town tuitioning status is worth checking:

If you move to a tuitioning town: Your high school student may have access to private school tuition funding up to the state cap. This is a genuine financial benefit — it's the difference between $0 and $19,000+ toward an independent school education.

If you move to a non-tuitioning town (has its own public school): Your child attends the local public school; no tuitioning applies. You can choose private school but pay full tuition without public subsidy.

To find out whether a Vermont town participates in tuitioning, contact the town's school board or supervisory union, or search the Vermont Agency of Education's tuitioning town list.

The Vermont Homeschool Alternative to School Choice

Since Vermont doesn't provide school choice funding for home study, Vermont homeschool families fund their own educational programs. The cost comparison matters:

Home study solo: Curriculum and materials, roughly $500-$2,500/year depending on approach. No tuition.

Home study microschool (shared instruction model): $2,400-$9,600/year per student for a pod with a part-time to full-time facilitator — still below most private school tuition.

Private school with tuitioning: $0 to $3,000 out of pocket for families in tuitioning towns choosing schools at or below the cap. This is genuinely competitive with microschool costs for families who qualify.

Private school without tuitioning (full tuition): $12,000-$22,000/year. No public subsidy.

For Vermont families in tuitioning towns, comparing private school options with tuitioning funding to a well-run microschool is a legitimate financial analysis. For families not in tuitioning towns, the microschool model is often the most cost-effective path to small-group personalized education.

Vermont School Choice Advocacy

Organizations like the Vermont School Choice Coalition have advocated for expanding school choice options — including ESA programs — in Vermont. Progress has been slow; Vermont's political climate is generally protective of public school funding. Families interested in the policy landscape can track advocacy efforts through these organizations.

If you're a Vermont family weighing your options and home study or microschool is on your list, the Vermont Micro-School & Pod Kit at /us/vermont/microschool/ covers the legal framework, operational structure, and documentation systems for running a microschool in Vermont — regardless of whether tuitioning funds are in the picture.

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