San Antonio-area school district offers more choices in response to private school choice

The largest public school district in San Antonio is trying to compete – not with neighboring districts, but with the growing popularity of private school options.

Thanks to Texas’s new private school choice program, Northside Independent School District (NISD) recently launched “Excellence Without Boundaries,” an open enrollment program allowing students from anywhere in the San Antonio area to apply to any of its 133 campuses.

Within the first week of the program’s launch on June 18, the application portal had 6,000 users and received 76 applications.

The move comes after Texas enacted a $1 billion private school choice program earlier this year that helps families pay for private school tuition and other educational costs.

“I think that it was the right time to go ahead and engage in this somewhat new free market of providing educational services,” Superintendent John Craft told the San Antonio Report.

“From a timing standpoint, we want to very intentionally and strategically place ourselves to be that option for families across the region and throughout Bexar County.”

Craft emphasized the importance of adapting as the educational landscape shifts.

San Antonio ISD trustee Alicia Sebastian added, “It is incumbent upon us to figure out how to play in the sandbox where everybody is pretty much fighting for the same resources.”

With charter schools and private schools gaining ground, NISD’s new program is aimed at keeping more students – and state funding – in the district.

NISD expects it will have 97,300 students for the 2025-26 school year. Craft hopes bringing in more students through open enrollment will boost the district’s average daily attendance, which directly impacts state funding.

Still, the program has some limits.

Students won’t automatically be accepted into their top-choice school, and NISD will consider attendance records, disciplinary history and each school’s capacity when reviewing applications.

The district also is trying to avoid cutting extracurriculars, something Craft said helps draw in new students.

“I firmly believe that the opportunities that we provide, particularly in the extracurricular arena, is exactly what attracts so many of our students to wanting to come to school,” he said.

The escalating school choice efforts come as public-school enrollment has dropped by over 1 million students nationwide since 2020, as The Lion reported.