With the Lottery booming and the Educational Enhancement Trust Fund well stocked, we ask the legislature to
1) Restore the Bright Futures book stipend to a minimum of $600 in statute
2) Fund the stipend accordingly in the 2022 budget
3) Uphold the 2018 legislation's intent to "permanently expand" Bright Futures: additional changes should not compromise or challenge the scholarships as 2021's SB 86 did, but expand them commensurate to Florida Lottery's increasing revenues.

The Florida Lottery exists to generate revenues to enhance public education in Florida including the state's signature Bright Futures Scholarship. Today, the Lottery is on a lucrative roll, with ten consecutive years of record-breaking sales. This year, the Lottery's contributions to Florida's Educational Enhancement Trust Fund were the highest ever, topping $2 billion.

Yet months ago Florida legislators, led by Representative Plasencia and Senator Broxson, declined to fund a component of the Bright Futures for 2021: the stipend. Designated in Florida Statutes as part of the Bright Futures Academic Scholars award, the stipend has existed since Bright Future's inception in 1997. While it has never increased to keep pace with rising textbook costs and course fees, it has been reduced and omitted during "lean" years. But in 2018, the Florida Legislature passed the "Excellence in Higher Education" bill which including re-establishing the stipend at $300 for fall and spring semesters. This bill was touted as "permanent expansion of the Florida Bright Futures Scholarship."

It took the legislature only two years to forget what "permanent" meant. In 2020, Senator Stargel filed a backtrack bill that stripped the stipend of its specific value ($300 per fall and spring semester), enabling the legislature to once again toggle the stipend's value annually. On cue, the legislature decided to not fund it at all this year, a budget decision impacting over 60,000 Florida college students from all economic backgrounds, including Pell Grant recipients, those who have no financial assistance from parents, and those already working multiple jobs to pay room and board.

So while the Florida Lottery is thriving, why did the legislature cut the stipend that students were counting on? Representative Plasencia told the media his opinion was that the stipend was subsidizing textbook companies and that in the future legislators would "consider" expanding digital textbook options at state universities so students, not just Bright Futures scholars, could access lower cost textbooks. College students and families would RALLY around reduced textbook costs for ALL, but the removal of the stipend that 60,000 students used to offset expenses of textbooks, digital and distance course fees, lab fees, and supplies doesn't accomplish that goal. It simply hurts the state's highest achieving students who have earned their scholarship and saw part of it vanish from their financial aid accounts this fall. Rather than cut the Academic Scholars' stipend, the legislature should have expanded it to Medallion Scholars--the money is there.

Bright Futures students work hard throughout high school to earn the scholarship and they persist in working hard during college to retain it. Their accomplishments improve local communities, which benefit from students' volunteer service hours, and the students' top academic achievements improve high schools and colleges, whose rankings benefit from higher GPAs and credit hour completion rates. Yet Senator Dennis Baxley dismissed Bright Futures last spring as an "entitlement program," an insult to the nearly 900,000 college students who have attended college aided by the scholarship. On the contrary, Bright Futures is an incentive to Florida high school graduates to pursue higher education; it helps retain Florida's most talented students in-state for college and residency beyond and promotes excellence within our colleges and universities. Keep it fully funded!