As the school year kicks back into gear, Locke published a new one-pager on private school readiness. It reviews how prepared private schools are for the increase in demand for non-public school options.

Today, over 25% of North Carolina’s 1.8 million K–12 students attend either a charter school, private school, or homeschool. 

That means they attend the school of their choice.

The Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) is a big driver of this growth in school-of-choice attendees. Over 80,000 students were awarded scholarships in 2024-2025, and enrollment is expected to continue to grow in the future. 

• North Carolina private schools have 21% unused capacity
  • This means they have room to grow
• More than 90% of private school leaders expect demand to keep rising
• The average aid package at responding schools covers about 78% of tuition
• School leaders and education entrepreneurs are very interested in expanding capacity to meet increased demand, but a lack of funding, excessive regulations, and hiring difficulties pose a challenge

1. Stabilize funding - Moving the Opportunity Scholarship and ESA+ programs to formula-based funding would establish reliable funding levels and remove important decisions from annual political debates
2. Market the Opportunity Scholarship and ESA+ programs - Creation of a private or public Scholarship Granting Office to champion the program by granting funds to market the programs across the state
3. Expand access to funding - Public dollars can be supplemented by contributions from individuals and corporations, which can be incentivized via tax credits
4. Reduce the regulatory burden on starting or expanding schools - Regulation of educational enterprise should be sufficient for public health and safety, and be applied equally
5. Encourage entrepreneurship - Laws and regulations should encourage, not punish, risk-taking

1) 💰💰💰 When asset protection becomes taxpayer exploitation

• Medicaid Asset Protection Trusts (MAPTs) are increasingly being used by affluent families to shield wealth and shift the cost of long-term care onto taxpayers
  • Medicaid was not intended to cover the long-term care costs of affluent families, and this trend is fiscally unsustainable, especially as the elderly population grows
• Medicaid Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) spending has been rising
  • Nationwide spending increased by 18.4% from FY 2019 to FY 2022
  • North Carolina's spending increased by 37.3% in the same period
• A MAPT is an irrevocable trust that moves assets out of a family's estate so they don't count toward Medicaid's strict asset limits, provided the transfer is done at least 5 years before applying for coverage
• To address this issue, policymakers should:
  • Reinstate and expand North Carolina's long-term care insurance tax credit
  • Strengthen state-level oversight of trust transfers
  • Call on Congress to extend the "lookback period" beyond 5 years
• Taxpayers should not be asked to underwrite the long-term care costs of families with the means to pay

You can read more here. 

2) 📜📜📜 Why NC’s Third Provincial Congress matters to the Revolution

• Locke attended a recent historical reenactment in Hillsborough, North Carolina, including a dramatization of the Third Provincial Congress of 1775
  • After the North Carolina colonial assembly was dissolved in April 1775, Royal Governor Josiah Martin fled his home in New Bern and eventually left the colony, leaving a period with no royal governor or representative government
  • The Third Provincial Congress met in Hillsborough, a symbolic location in the "backcountry", representing 35 counties, and signaling a shift in power away from the old political regime in New Bern
• The Third Provincial Congress took critical steps that prepared the colony for revolution. It:
  • Created 6 militia districts to organize for defense
  • Formed a Provincial Council to act as an interim government
  • Established Committees of Safety to recruit local militias
  • Raised 2 companies of Continental troops to join the larger war effort
  • Issued its own currency (bills of credit) to fund the new government and military
• The actions taken by the Third Provincial Congress in the summer of 1775 were every bit as revolutionary as the battles and resolves that came later
  • Anyone interested in the Revolutionary period should visit Hillsborough, a town full of colonial history

You can read the full dispatch here. 

3) 🗣️🗣️🗣️ Standing up for free speech

• Locke believes that the government’s first duty is to protect freedom, not trample on it
• Which is why Locke joined other liberty organizations in filing an amicus brief in  the case of First Choice Women’s Resource Centers v. Platkin before the U.S. Supreme Court
  • The case concerns New Jersey's Attorney General demanding private donor information from a pro-life organization
  • This demand is not about law enforcement, but about intimidating those who support causes the government dislikes
  • It draws a parallel to the civil rights era, when Alabama tried to force the NAACP to disclose its member lists, and the Supreme Court ruled against it to prevent harassment and intimidation
• Donors deserve privacy, and citizens should be able to support causes they care about without fearing exposure or harassment
  • In an era of doxing, donor privacy is especially important for protecting free speech and association
  • This is why NC lawmakers passed the Personal Privacy Protection Act over Governor Stein’s veto
    • It protects citizens’ rights to support causes they believe in without fear of harassment or retribution
  • New Jersey’s heavy-handed tactics prove why laws like ours are necessary
  • If government officials can weaponize their power against groups they dislike, no one’s free speech is safe
• The Supreme Court now has the chance to remind every state that the First Amendment is not optional but foundational to our liberty
  • If the Supreme Court rules for First Choice, it will send a clear message that the  government cannot bully citizens into silence
  • That would be good news not only for pro-life groups, but for every American who values freedom of thought, speech, and association
  • At the John Locke Foundation, we’ll continue to stand with those who resist government overreach because liberty, once lost, is rarely regained

You can read more about the brief here.