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“What do we want?”

“Options and choice!”

“When do we want it?”

“Now!”

So chanted roughly a hundred demonstrators outside the Legislature on Monday, hoisting white signs with big red hearts emblazoned with “#SchoolChoice” — an early valentine for legislators inside. It was the latest in a now-regular legislative scene over the last decade, a biennial — and so far largely unsuccessful — call to lawmakers to back school choice laws. 

Republicans have for years jockeyed for such legislation in the absence of the party’s previous success: Education Savings Accounts (ESAs). An expansive 2015 program designed under former Gov. Brian Sandoval and a GOP-controlled Legislature, the program was left intact even as its funding mechanism was gutted by the Nevada Supreme Court. 

Democrats in control of the budget from 2017 onward, however, left the funding question untouched. When they took control of the Legislature and the governor’s office in 2019, Democratic lawmakers axed ESAs altogether. 

But now a Republican is back in Gov. Joe Lombardo, who made school choice a pivotal part of his campaign platform — even if Democrats still maintain their legislative grip. 

Flanked by demonstrators, many of them children and students of Nevada private or charter schools, Senate Minority Leader Heidi Seevers Gansert (R-Reno) made another call for the state to expand Opportunity Scholarships, which are designed to subsidize private school costs for families under a certain income threshold. 

Under Lombardo’s proposed budget, those scholarships would see funding authorization jump from $7 million to $50 million. Under a forthcoming bill, the income threshold would jump from 300 percent of the poverty line to 500 percent. 

“When you look at the money, the $50 million is only one half of 1 percent — one half of 1 percent — of the entire K-12 budget,” Seevers Gansert said. “It is a small amount, and it's really helping to serve students on an individual basis.”

Sen. Carrie Buck (R-Henderson), meanwhile, made renewed calls for accountability within the public school system. 

That includes two of her own proposed bills, yet to be introduced, that would require an additional year of elementary school for students held back because they are not proficient in both reading and math, as well as a proposal that would put schools under state receivership should they fail certain benchmarks for three consecutive years. 

“My Senate Republican colleagues and I must not overlook the hundreds of thousands of students who benefit from our traditional district public schools,” Buck said. “We must also look out for their well-being. For too long, for over 10 years, many schools have been consistently underperforming without any accountability measures in place, or any viable options nearby.”

How those bills will traverse a Legislature with Democrats in firm control of both chambers remains unclear. 

Editor’s Note: This story first appeared in Behind the Bar, The Nevada Independent’s newsletter dedicated to comprehensive coverage of the 2023 Legislature. Sign up for the newsletter here.