Florida’s Quiet Attack on AP, IB, and Dual Enrollment: A Temporary Win—and a Warning
When Florida lawmakers tried to balance the K–12 budget—strained by an estimated $4 billion in voucher costs this year—they proposed cutting in half the performance funding for academic acceleration programs (like AP, IB, AICE, and Dual Enrollment) in public high schools.
In a rare show of resistance, public school parents organized and pushed back. And it worked.
As Orlando Sentinel columnist Scott Maxwell described in his June 20, 2025 column:
“Tallahassee politicians were forced last week to abandon their plans to gut funding for AP classes in public schools after they ran into something they rarely encounter in this state — a wall of public opposition.”
He continued:
“Republican lawmakers were attacking something that was both successful and popular, affecting more than 110,000 students… The pressure ultimately worked. When leaders from both chambers went behind closed doors last week to hash out their final budget proposal, they ditched this latest attack on public schools in quiet, unceremonial fashion.”
It was a grassroots win—proof that public engagement can still make a difference.
But let’s be clear: the legislature didn’t walk away from their goal. Instead, they quietly changed the way the programs are funded, setting up a future path to defund them without triggering immediate backlash.
To understand what they did, you need to understand how the previous funding was calculated and to understand that you need a basic understanding of how Florida’s K-12 funding formula, the Florida Education Finance Program (FEFP) works. The FEFP is designed to ensure each of the 67 school districts receives equitable funding—balancing student needs, local costs, and district characteristics. It’s considered a national model for equity and, while the details can make it seem complex, the basic system is relatively easy to understand. You can read more in detail here.
Why Funding Changes Matter: A Primer on Florida’s FEFP
The core mechanics of the Florida Education Finance Program (FEFP) are straightforward:
- Count the Students (FTE)
Districts report student enrollment in Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) units based on instructional hours. - Adjust for Student Needs (Weighted FTE)
Some students cost more to educate. “Weights” are added for programs like special ed, ESOL, and academic acceleration, producing a “Weighted FTE” (WFTE). - Multiply by the Base Student Allocation (BSA)
WFTE is multiplied by a set dollar amount per student (BSA), then adjusted for geographic costs and other factors.
WFTE × BSA = Base FEFP funding - Add Categorical Funds Extra money is added for specific needs: reading, safety, digital tools, etc.
- Factor in Local Taxes The state determines how much the districts must raise via local property taxes (Required Local Effort). The more property rich a district is, the higher the percentage of funding they are expected to raise through local property taxes. For districts with lower property values, the state pitches in a higher percentage of the funding.
- State Contribution The state calculates its contribution plus additions like funding for Class Size Reduction and the State’s contribution to cover the discretionary millage for voucher recipients.
- Final Calculation The total funding is divided by the number of students to determine the average per-pupil funding.
What Changed: From Add-On Weights to a Categorical Fund
For more than two decades, academic acceleration programs, like AP, IB or AICE, have received performance funding via add-on weights in the FEFP. The more students who passed AP/IB exams or earned certifications, the more funding a district received.
In 2023, in an attempt to “modernize” the FEFP in the face of Florida’s Universal Voucher funding, the Legislature bundled several categoricals into the Base FEFP, boosting the BSA by over $550 and raising the cost of every weighted program—including advanced coursework. Lawmakers have been looking to claw back that money ever since.
Their first attempt—to cut the add-on weights in half—triggered public outrage. Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka, Chair of the House PreK-12 Budget subcommittee, blamed school disticts for mismanaging of the incentive funding and insisted the cuts were necessary address the alleged mismanagement. Senate Appropriations Chair Danny Burgess tried to spin it as aligning funding with actual costs, but parents weren’t fooled.
So, instead, the Legislature preserved the current funding but rewrote the rules.
Introducing the Academic Acceleration Options Supplement (AAOS)
Rather than using add-on weights, the 2025–26 budget moves all performance funding—totaling $596.7 million—into a new categorical called the Academic Acceleration Options Supplement (AAOS). During each budget cycle, the Florida Legislature reviews and adjusts categorical funding, impacting the total amount allocated to each category.
Per SB 2510, here’s how it will now work:
- Students still earn the same “points” for completing AP, IB, AICE, and career certification programs:
- 0.16 for passing AP, IB, or AICE exams
- 0.3 for earning an IB or AICE diploma
- 0.025–1.0 for CAPE certifications, depending on rigor
- Districts will report their total “acceleration values” to the DOE.
- The total AAOS funding will be divided among districts proportionally based on their share of points earned statewide.
- The total pot is fixed by appropriators annually—districts won’t necessarily get more money when more students succeed.
Why It Matters
The point system hasn’t changed, but the funding mechanism has. The new categorical fund will be:
- Reviewed and adjusted annually by the Legislature
- The total funding available will no longer depend on the earned add-on weights and the BSA but will reflect budgetary decisions.
- The funding will be vulnerable to future cuts without a noticable change in point values
New rules also restrict how the funds can be spent—on exam fees, teacher bonuses, materials, and training—and districts must report how they use the funds beginning in 2026.
This creates a clear path for lawmakers to quietly reduce funding in future years, using the complexity of the FEFP to mask the cuts.
The Takeaway
Parents and public school advocates won this round—but I fear the win is only temporarily.
The Legislature believes these programs are overfunded, and they’ve now given themselves a tool to reduce funding without changing laws or triggering headlines. As long as they keep the point values intact, they can claim nothing has changed—while shrinking the size of the pot.
Future defunding will be quiet, buried in budget documents, and defended as “technical adjustments.”
As Maxwell wrote:
“Imagine for a moment if Floridians used their voices more often.”
They’ll need to. Because the next attack won’t come with a press release—it’ll come in the fine print.
When you see your lawmakers out and about town this summer, let them know you will be watching closely and ready to defend further cuts to our public school programs.