This testimony was delivered to the Alaska Legislature’s Task Force on Education Funding.
My name is Jude Schwalbach. I am a senior education policy analyst with Reason Foundation, a national non-profit think tank. Since 2022, I’ve published an annual research paper about model open enrollment policies, examining the existing systems in all 50 states, ranking and grading them, and comparing them with best practices.
K-12 open enrollment allows students to transfer to public schools other than their assigned schools. There are two types of open enrollment: cross-district open enrollment lets students transfer to schools outside their district, while within-district open enrollment lets students transfer to schools within their district but outside their catchment area.
Overall, these policies are popular and supported by research, especially when they maximize students’ transfer options. A national YouGov poll from November 2025 showed that 64% of respondents thought students should be able to attend any public school, regardless of where they live. Similarly, national polling from September 2025 by EdChoice-Morning Consult showed that 74% of parents with school-aged children supported strong open enrollment laws.
Policymakers have taken note, and open enrollment proposals have been successful nationwide, with 17 states strengthening their laws since 2020. Notably, the laws in Idaho, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, and West Virginia were passed with significant bipartisan support.
Open enrollment’s popularity isn’t without cause, as many public school students use it to attend schools that are a good fit for them.
An overview of the research and data
Research on open enrollment shows that it fosters excellence, positively impacting students and schools. A major driver of student participation in open enrollment is access to better schools. For instance, data from Arizona, Florida, and Texas showed that the vast majority of students transferred to schools rated as A or B on state tests, 90%, 94%, and 95%, respectively. Similarly, in 2016 and 2021, California’s nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) found that nearly all students participating in the state’s District of Choice program transferred to districts with higher test scores.
Better academics aren’t the only reason students use open enrollment; oftentimes, students also want to attend public schools that are a better fit. For example, in California, students used it to escape bullying, access college courses, such as Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes, and specialized learning. In Wisconsin and West Virginia, some students rely on open enrollment to shorten their commutes. Meanwhile, some students in Colorado and Massachusetts used the policy to access smaller class sizes.
The national landscape for open enrollment
Open enrollment is a common form of school selection for many students. Working with data from 19 states, a 2025 Reason Foundation report found that 1.6 million students used the policy.
Generally, students tend to use within-district open enrollment at higher rates than cross-district open enrollment.
However, high participation rates, as seen in states such as Colorado, Delaware, and Arizona, don’t happen overnight. Long-term data show that programs tend to scale up with time. For example, Wisconsin’s open enrollment program hosted about 2,500 participants when it launched in 1998. As of the 2024-25 school year, nearly 62,000 students use it, but this growth was incremental, increasing by about 13% annually, which gave districts time to adjust to fluctuating enrollments.
Open enrollment participation also varies by locale and population density. Generally, students transfer to nearby districts or those where their parents work. This means that students whose families are comfortable with a reasonable commute can transfer to districts in various locales, including rural areas. Data obtained from 19 states showed that many students used open enrollment to transfer to schools in rural areas. In 10 of these states, rural districts gained the majority of transfers statewide. This illustrates that rural districts can benefit from open enrollment so long as they are within striking range.
Model open enrollment policy for states like Alaska
While 43 states have some sort of open enrollment policy, most policies are weak or ineffective because school districts can choose not to participate or artificially cap the number of transfers they accept. Accordingly, strong open enrollment laws level the playing field for applicants. Specifically, they recalibrate the relationship between students and public schools, increasing student agency in school selection.
Reason Foundation identifies seven key elements of a strong open enrollment law. These provisions safeguard students’ schooling options and maximize transparency for families, policymakers, and taxpayers.
Using these metrics, Reason Foundation ranks and grades the open enrollment laws in all 50 states on a 100-point scale. State laws receive grades consistent with letter grades. For instance, states scoring between 90 and 100 points receive an “A,” and so forth.
The most important of these best practices are the first and second ones, which require all school districts to participate in open enrollment so long as space is available. These policies ensure that transfer students who can fill these seats have the option to do so. Currently, 16 states have strong cross-district open enrollment laws, and 17 states have strong within-district open enrollment laws. Nine states have both.
While I won’t address all metrics in depth, I want to highlight those related to state and local transparency. Well-designed transparency provisions at the state and local levels also give policymakers and the public the data to hold districts accountable for their open enrollment practices. Annual open enrollment reports, published on the state department of education’s website, provide insights about the scale and impact of the program on districts and state funding. Wisconsin’s report is the gold standard for state-level transparency and has been regularly released since the late 1990s.
Similarly, transparency provisions at the district level that require districts to post their available capacity by grade level and to post all open enrollment procedures on their websites ensure that families know when, where, and how to apply for a transfer.
Reason Foundation’s study applies these metrics apply to each state’s laws, ranking them from best to worst. These rankings change every year as states pass new laws, and 17 states have improved their open enrollment laws since 2020. Moreover, in just last year, nearly 100 open enrollment proposals were introduced across 34 states. I expect this momentum to continue in the coming years.
Looking forward in Alaska
Unfortunately, Alaska does not have robust open enrollment provisions established in state law. The Last Frontier State ties with three other states, Maine, Maryland, and North Carolina, for dead last, scoring 0 out of 100 points in Reason’s best practices for open enrolment. This is because the state doesn’t have a codified open enrollment program. Some school districts, such as Anchorage and Fairbanks North Star Borough, operate limited student transfer policies, but these policies are implemented solely at the districts’ discretion.
Alaska should adopt a strong cross- and within-district open enrollment policy that ensures transfers are free for students and their families. Other states with many rural districts, such as Montana and North Dakota, have robust open enrollment policies that students widely use. For instance, Montana and North Dakota’s rural districts gained more students than they lost overall, increasing their enrollments on net by about one student and seven students per district, respectively.
At the very least, Alaska could adopt a robust within-district policy, as Nevada has. About 74% of Alaska’s students reside in non-rural districts. Similarly, about 88% of Nevada’s K-12 population resides in just two counties. Accordingly, Nevada adopted a strong within-district policy because it would affect the largest number of students. Additionally, family-friendly provisions, such as LEA transparency, should be adopted so that families know when and where to apply for transfers.
Additionally, the state should collect and publish all transfer data annually, as five other states do: Nevada, Wisconsin, and West Virginia. These data give families and policymakers the tools to tweak and improve the state’s open enrollment policy over time.
Thank you for your time, and please don’t hesitate to reach out with any questions.