Financing Your Salpointe Education
25
Audio Transcript Auto-generated
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Hello,
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welcome to the guide for tuition assistance
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presented by South Point Catholic High School.
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This presentation will go over the two
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main options that South Point Catholic families use
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to make a South Point Catholic education possible
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for every student regardless of economic background.
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For any additional help or questions,
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please contact the finance office at 520547 5891.
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Or go to our website under financial aid
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to email our financial aid managers
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overall.
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South Point Catholic believes in investing in the future regardless of economic,
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academic or ethnic backgrounds. 99% of our graduates attend college,
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we are committed
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to ensuring that admitted students have the opportunity
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to attend South Point Catholic High School.
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Regardless of economic circumstances,
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you can also help by donating your tax credits.
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If you're involved in an S Corp or AC Corp,
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you can donate your tax dollars to South Point Catholic High School.
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Please contact Jen Harris our Director of Advancement.
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But overall,
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let's look at the two main options that families utilize
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for tuition assistance for South Point Catholic High School.
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It's important to note that Arizona is a school choice state
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which means
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families have the opportunity to attend a variety of schools
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which are either totally financed or partially financed through the
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Arizona State government.
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The first option that we're going to
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look at is the empowerment scholarship accounts.
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This is a relatively new universal program
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where families
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can qualify for direct tuition assistance directly from the state of Arizona.
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Option two is the traditional financial aid
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scholarship tuition organizations or tax credits.
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And we'll view both of these options.
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It's also important to note
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that while you can apply for each option, option one and option two,
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you cannot accept both options for the same school year.
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Thus, if you decide to go with ES A, the empowerment scholarship accounts,
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you cannot also receive financial aid scholarship tuition organization
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awards or tax credits.
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Option one for our families is the empowerment scholarship accounts.
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This is a direct account
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given by the state of Arizona for families that wish to leave public education.
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If families choose to leave public education,
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they simply apply through the Department of Education website,
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they will receive a contract and the state
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will provide a certain amount of money per year
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for that student to attend a private school.
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Usually empowerment scholarships are worth about $7600 a year.
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But again, if you choose the empowerment scholarship account option,
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this is the only thing you can do for scholarship assistance during the school year.
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So how it works by opting out of the public school system,
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parents can seek a range of alternative educational services
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such as private schools or home based education.
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Again, you cannot combine this with option two.
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So here's how you apply.
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This is going to be available in the spring of 2025 for the 2025 2026 school year.
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You simply go to
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the Arizona Department of Education. The ES A
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website,
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you choose the universal option and you upload
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a birth certificate and proof of residency.
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Once you do this,
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you will get approved for a contract,
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you'll read through the contract which will go through in a second,
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digitally sign it
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and that will go back to the state indicating that you
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are going to leave public education for the next school year
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and enter a private school
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later on over the summer. You'll get a what's called a class wallet account.
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This is actually where you transfer money
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to help pay for your students, private school education
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and you'll have to do this each quarter because that is how ES A is funded,
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it's funded on a quarterly basis throughout the year.
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So it's also important to note that the contract you
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receive from ES A is worded in such a way.
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What parents automatically do is they look at the number on the contract,
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they don't read through all of the different sentences in the contract.
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So as you see in this sample,
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this student was accept, was accepted for an ES A account.
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And on a quarterly basis, they receive
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$1966.35.
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A lot of times when parents get a contract,
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they look at that amount and they immediately call South Point Catholic saying,
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well,
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I thought you said this was gonna be worth about $7500.
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Unfortunately, those parents didn't read the entire sentence
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that $1966.35
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is awarded on a quarterly basis.
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Thus, if you take that number and you times it by four,
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you're you're now suddenly up to the high 7000 area.
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The amounts of this are purely based on your zip code and address.
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You do not have to upload tax documents. You do not have to
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provide any other financial information.
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All the state needs is a copy of your student's birth certificate
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and a current proof of residency.
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It's also important to note that if your student has a 504
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plan or an IE plan where they
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get extra educational accommodations,
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you can upload this information into your ES
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A portal as those students usually receive more money
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to cover those educational accommodation expenses.
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So again, this is option one,
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the ES A
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Sorry about this. I pressed the wrong button as you can see this was recorded
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in person by a live human being.
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All right.
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The next option.
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This is traditional financial aid
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the use of scholarship, tuition organizations and tax credits.
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Now, for option two,
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these can be combined and stacked together,
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which means based on a student's educational need,
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you can receive a financial aid award from South Point Catholic.
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You can also receive scholarships from tuition organizations
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and you can utilize the tax credit program in the state of Arizona.
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However, you cannot combine these with option one, which is the ES A
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so traditional financial aid.
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This is what a lot of parents know as
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how you get assistance from a private school.
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This is purely based on a student's need
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or the family's need on how to pay for a private school education.
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So South Point Catholics is
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supported through CTSL
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and newly admitted students and current students qualify for on the on the basis of
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demonstrated need as determined by factors such as
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income, family size assets, liabilities, et cetera.
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These awards can range anywhere from 1000 to $7000.
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You can combine these with the other things in option two,
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these are need based awards and you must apply every single year.
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How do you apply? You can actually do this right now.
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You can go to the fair website,
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use South Point school code of 800 in the password CTSL 800.
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You fill out the online application.
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All right, click yes, on the request financial aid
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and be sure to select the 2526 school year
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over 400 students were helped this year alone
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with over $3 million in tuition assistance.
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So
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the next thing
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that families utilizing option two can do
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is they can contact scholarship tuition organizations.
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What these are
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is these are organizations that direct tax credits
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to Children attending grades K through 12 at a qualified private school
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in Arizona.
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This is just a simple list of some ST Os in Arizona.
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I believe there's over 60 ST Os in the state of Arizona.
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So obviously, this isn't the entire list,
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but this is a list of a lot of the ST Os that South Point Catholic families utilize
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throughout the school year.
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You can see that they all have different websites, they all have different
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application opening dates, et cetera
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and the majority of these are
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are available based on household income.
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So if you want more information about these,
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please contact the individual sto for more information or
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you can contact our financial aid office and they can help guide you
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to which ST Os may be best for you and your family.
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Now,
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the last part of option two are tax credits.
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This is also known as the recommended referral program for the State of Arizona.
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This is the most different program that a lot of families see
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because it is unique to Arizona.
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So how the Arizona State Tax credit program works
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is families can get referral or recommended tax credits from
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friends and family members in the state of Arizona,
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there are no income restrictions
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for the people donating their tax credits, they get a dollar for dollar match
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and you can do this starting today
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for the next school year.
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So how it works.
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What you first have to do is you have
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to sign up with a scholarship tuition organization,
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an sto
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that does the referral recommended program.
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Ctsoibe Arizona tuition connection are some of these organizations.
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Once you sign up with that sto
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they will give you directions on how to
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refer friends and family members to their websites
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to make a tax credit donation.
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Once that friend or family member gets that information,
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they simply go to the website,
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they follow the instructions and they can make a donation to your student
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for their private high school tuition.
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And again,
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that person making the donation gets a dollar for
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dollar tax credit from the state of Arizona.
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It's also important to note that only people who owe Arizona
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state taxes can claim the dollar for dollar tax credit.
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So if it's a relative living in California,
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this wouldn't work for them
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if it's a grandparent living in the state
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of Arizona who don't pay any Arizona state taxes
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because they're retired, this wouldn't work for them.
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However, if a person is living in the state of Arizona
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and they pay Arizona state taxes, whether they owe at the end of the year or not,
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they're still paying into the tax program
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every single year they can do this and get a dollar for dollar tax credit.
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This can be done every single year by the same people.
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Thus, from a family member, you could get tax credits from them
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every single year and you can stack that money
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every year to provide for yourself. Your student South Point Catholic tuition.
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Now
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you cannot contribute to your own student.
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These are state laws so you can't contribute to your own kid.
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And also
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you cannot make a deal with other parents
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where parent A says I will contribute to, to parent B
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and parent B says I will contribute to parent C
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as long as parent C contributes back to parent A.
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So you can't do that.
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And also these funds cannot be combined with option one, the, the ES A program.
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So again, you can do this starting today,
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you can do this for the 2024 tax year.
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And for those people who are already doing tax credits to public schools,
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you can do this right alongside the public school tax credit.
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They are individual tax credits in the state of Arizona.
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So
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enough with the theory, let's go to actual numbers.
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You need to decide what is best for your family
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overall.
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We recommend that you apply to everything, apply to the ES A, apply to financial aid,
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apply to the ST Os.
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See about the tax credit recommended referral system.
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But you could at the end of the day, you can only choose one.
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So let's look at hard numbers.
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The ES A program, our tuition this year for new students is $12,660.
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If you get a $7800 ES A award,
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you owe $4860 or $486 per month
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that you have to pay again. There's no other financial aid
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that's available with this.
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So if you're good, paying less than $500 a month for a South Point education,
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this is the program for you
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financial aid and sto so again, these are need based. So if you're a family
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that qualifies for financial aid and ST Os,
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you could get a $7000 reward from South Point Catholic,
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another 4500 from other other ST Os
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that leaves you with an $1160
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balance or uh uh $116 per month.
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And again, these are just simply examples,
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you can apply to other ST Os and do the tax credit program as well.
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And finally, the tax credit program,
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if you,
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if you get four referrals from married couples,
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married couples can give right around $2800 each.
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I believe
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those four referrals for married couples equals $10,400.
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Thus, you are left with the remaining balance of $2260 or $226 per month.
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You can always get other tax credits. You can always get other ST Os
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and then any unused tax credits can roll over for the next two years.
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So
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overall you can get started on these things today.
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You can get going on tax credits starting on November 1st, which has already passed.
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You can fill out the financial aid applications and es a
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applications for the 2526 school year open in the spring.
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I hope you enjoyed today's presentation again. For any questions
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or extra information. Please contact the
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South Point Catholic Financial Aid office at 520547 5891.
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Thank you so much for your time and have a great day.