{"id":2668,"date":"2026-07-02T05:04:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T05:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/arizonamovinginsider.com\/?p=2668"},"modified":"2026-07-02T05:04:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T05:04:00","slug":"661m-spent-through-arizonas-esa-program-heres-where-the-money-is-going","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arizonamovinginsider.com\/?p=2668","title":{"rendered":"$661M spent through Arizona’s ESA program. Here’s where the money is going"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Millions of products and services have flowed through Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account program, the state initiative that helps parents pay for private education or homeschooling. A new look at the program’s purchasing data reveals where that money is going \u2014 and raises some questions about a portion of it.<\/p>\n

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The dataset covers 2.6 million separate transactions over a four-year period, totaling about $661 million. Of that, roughly $230 million \u2014 about 37% \u2014 was spent through the program’s online marketplace.<\/p>\n

Two-thirds of that marketplace spending, about $164 million, went to Amazon. Apple was second at nearly $19 million, followed by Outschool, an online learning platform, at $12 million. Staples and Lakeshore Learning Center rounded out the top five vendors.<\/p>\n

An analysis of product descriptions across all marketplace purchases suggests that, on the surface, most of the spending aligns with the program’s educational intent. About $60 million \u2014 a quarter of all marketplace spending \u2014 went toward computers and technology. Another $30 million went to online learning, $14 million to books, with other categories trailing from there.<\/p>\n

But some transactions stand out.<\/p>\n

The single priciest Amazon purchase included a high-end digital camera, professional lenses and a MacBook Pro \u2014 totaling nearly $11,000. The second-largest was a set of components to build a high-performance gaming PC, coming in at just under $10,000. One ESA account spent more than $9,000 on a complete electric guitar live setup, including a $2,500 guitar and a $1,300 amplifier.<\/p>\n

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Critics of the program have pointed to purchases like those as excessive. Guitars, specifically, illustrate the range. Among the data: a $3,600 Martin, a $3,100 Ibanez and two Taylor acoustics priced above $2,500.<\/p>\n

At the same time, more than 1,500 guitars in the dataset were priced between $150 and $300 \u2014 closer to what you’d expect to see in a typical educational setting.<\/p>\n

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

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. A new look at the program’s purchasing data reveals where that money is going \u2014 and raises some questions about a portion of it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2667,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news"],"yoast_head":"\n$661M spent through Arizona's ESA program. Here's where the money is going - Arizona Moving Insider<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/arizonamovinginsider.com\/?p=2668\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"$661M spent through Arizona's ESA program. 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