The Educational Improvement Tax Credit (EITC) Program is fully subscribed for the 2008-2009 fiscal year. According to the State Department of Community and Economic Development, businesses have submitted enough applications to use all of the EITC credits for the fourth year in a row. The EITC Program is currently capped at $75 million, with $44.7 million allocated for scholarships for students in grades K-12, $8 million for pre-K scholarships and $22.3 million for innovative programming in public schools.

“Fully utilizing the tax credits signals to the Pennsylvania General Assembly that Pennsylvania businesses have a strong desire to be good corporate citizens by investing directly in children’s education,” says Andrew T. Lefevre, Executive Director of the REACH Foundation. “Without the $75 million EITC Program, tens of thousands of children would be forced into a school that is failing to educate them based on their needs and thousands of innovated educational programs would not be funded in our public schools.”

Through the EITC Program, businesses can direct their tax dollars directly to education. They can receive a 75% tax credit for a one year contribution and a 90% for a two year commitment. In 2008, the Pennsylvania legislature voted to expand the program to allow Subchapter S corporations to be able to participate and increased the business cap to $300,000 ($150,000 for businesses contributing to a pre-K scholarship organization).  The Pennsylvania Catholic Conference has a qualified scholarship foundation.REACH Foundation news release June 25, 2009.  Founded in 1993, the REACH (Road to Educational Achievement through CHoice) Foundation is dedicated to ensuring parental choice in education in Pennsylvania. REACH continually promotes policies that enable statewide parental choice in education, including the well-established and highly successful EITC Program. For more information on the REACH Foundation, visit http://www.paschoolchoice.org/.