In 1998, a young Tampa venture capitalist named John Kirtley discovered the lack of educational options available for low-income children and decided to take matters into his own hands. Kirtley, working with the national Children's Scholarship Fund, created the Children's Scholarship Fund of Tampa Bay to provide privately funded scholarships for low-income children to attend a K-8 school of their choice. In three months, with little publicity, his program received 12,500 applications for 750 scholarships. His passion was born.
In 2001, Kirtley took his cause to the Florida Legislature. Lawmakers responded by creating the Tax Credit Scholarship Program, also known as Step Up For Students, for low-income students in grades K-12. The program was set up to give corporations a dollar-for-dollar state tax credit for the money they contributed and to give students a scholarship to a qualifying private school or transportation to an out-of-district public school. In the first year, the scholarship limit was set at $3,500 and the program limit at $50-million. House sponsor Joe Negron said, upon its passage, "This puts the parents in charge".
In recent years, the program has expanded to meet the growing demand. In 2006, lawmakers adopted a comprehensive set of financial and educational controls, including the requirement that each student in the program take a standardized test recognized by the state Department of Education. Three different independent research organizations – the Collins Center for Public Policy, Florida TaxWatch and the state Office of Program Policy and Government Analysis – have concluded that the program has saved the public education system money.
In 2010, the Legislature put the scholarship program on a path for continued growth and success. The bill it passed into law allows for the cap to grow by 25 percent when 90 percent of the cap is reached in the prior year and it indexes the scholarship amount to public school spending, ultimately reaching 80 percent of the basic per-student operational formula. New potential tax sources for tax credits were added, bringing the total to five: corporate income, insurance premium, alcoholic beverage excise, direct pay sales and oil and gas severance. Also, the law requires individual schools of sufficient size to disclose test score gains and financial information. The expansion bill was passed by a broad bipartisan majority.