Last week, while waiting to pick up my child, the mom in the car next to me rolled down her window and suddenly asked, "Did you get TEFA? We're still on the waitlist."

That one question made me curious. Just how many people got in and how many are waiting? In our neighborhood's mom group chat, everyone was talking, but no one knew the exact numbers.

TEFA stands for Texas Education Freedom Accounts. It's commonly referred to as the Texas education voucher program, and the 2026-27 school year is its first year.

The state legislature allocated $1 billion for the first year's budget. This can be used for private school tuition, homeschooling materials, tutoring, special education services, school supplies, and uniforms.

The application period was from February 4 to March 31. During that time, over 274,000 applications were submitted, which honestly surprised me when I saw the number.

Out of these, 25,400 applications were filtered out due to ineligibility. The rest became eligible for the lottery.

The Comptroller's office stated that this is a national record for first-year applications for a new school choice program. No one expected demand to be this high.

So, who got selected first? This is where the tier system comes into play.

Priority tier one includes students with disabilities from households earning below 500% of the federal poverty line. For a family of four, that's roughly under $160,000 a year.

Tier two includes families earning below 200% of the poverty line. For a family of four, that's under $64,300 a year.

Tier three includes families earning between 200% and 500%. Many dual-income Korean families likely fall into this category.

Tier four includes families with higher incomes, and only 20% of the total budget can be allocated to this group.

According to the results of the April lottery, 28,233 tier one students and their 16,520 siblings were selected. In tier two, 51,181 were accepted.

On the other hand, the waitlist included 20,383 from tier two, 65,368 from tier three, and 66,951 from tier four. Essentially, no one from tiers three and four got in during the first lottery.

Looking closer at the tier four waitlist, there were 13,245 students who attended public school last year, while 53,706 did not. This indicates that many were already in private or homeschooling situations.

After that, as spots opened up due to withdrawals, they were offered to those on the waitlist. In June, 5,499 waitlisted students received additional selection notifications. The process follows the order of tier and lottery number.

As of the June 10 announcement, the number of selected students exceeded 102,000. At the same time, the waitlist was just under 145,000, with nearly 13,000 from tier two.

The August 13 announcement revealed that 101,600 students were actually receiving funds. This is the first time in this type of program that over 100,000 students have received accounts in the first year.

Let's touch on the amounts. Students attending private schools receive up to $10,474.

Students with disabilities can receive up to $30,000, while homeschooling students get $2,000 a year.

Funds for private school do not come all at once. They are distributed in three installments: 25% on July 1, 25% on October 1, and the remaining 50% on February 1 of the following year.

So, for families that have been selected, the first of this month was the second payment date. Be sure to check your account.

What should families on the waitlist do now? The opt-in deadline for this year was July 15, which has already passed, so the chances of getting a spot this school year seem slim.

Still, make sure to keep your email notifications open. Sometimes they end up in the spam folder, so it's good to check occasionally. The official site educationfreedom.texas.gov continues to post updates about additional selections.

I am in favor of this program. I believe that allowing parents to choose how to spend education funds created by taxes will encourage schools to compete and improve.

However, it's clear that the numbers are disappointing. More than half of the applicants are waiting at the door, indicating that the budget is not keeping up with demand at all.

Those against it worry that public school budgets will decrease. I can understand that concern.

However, the fact that over 274,000 people raised their hands indicates that there are many parents who want options. I believe it's hard to ignore that voice.

If I were a parent on the waitlist, I would first check the application schedule for next year. And I would prepare my income documents and proof of my child's enrollment in advance. The lottery is a matter of luck, but being disqualified due to incomplete documents is entirely my responsibility.

I plan to share this story with the mom in the pickup line today. If you know anyone who received a waitlist notification, please share this with them.