Edinburg CISD and McAllen ISD families held more funded Education Freedom Accounts than residents of any other Region 1 district in TEFA's first year, yet the program still confuses a lot of Valley parents. Which schools take it? Does a Spanish-speaking 3-year-old qualify for funded pre-K? How does it fit with parish pricing or South Texas College dual credit? We answer those questions in plain language.
Each family works with a School Funding Advisor who reviews home district, likely income tier, the schools on the shortlist and every child's grade, then writes out a funding plan and makes introductions to schools that take those sources. Our work is supported by a private partner focused on growing church-run and community schools. We disclose that relationship wherever it applies, and it has no influence on which funding sources we recommend.
Where the school data comes from
TEFA status. On October 12, 2026 we pulled every listing in the Comptroller's participating-school finder (finder.educationfreedom.texas.gov, run by Odyssey) for Hidalgo and Starr counties, pre-K providers included, and kept the descriptions, programs and discounts each school entered. A school in the finder is accredited by TEA or a TEPSAC-recognized agency, has operated at least two school years, and tests its students annually.
Federal school records. Enrollment, teacher counts, religious orientation and association memberships come from the U.S. Department of Education's Private School Survey public-use files for 2023-24, with the 2021-22 file covering schools that didn't answer the newer one. That survey also catches established Valley schools that aren't in TEFA, so our 21-school directory is a little larger than the state's list.
Profile pages. A school gets its own page only when public records give us something real to say: federal enrollment and staffing figures, or a TEFA listing with a substantive description or program list. Every other school still appears in the directory tables, and schools can claim their listing to add more.
Funding figures. Award amounts, approved uses and pre-K eligibility come from educationfreedom.texas.gov. District funded-student counts come from the Comptroller's TEFA Annual Demographic Report (data as of July 29, 2026), and IEP totals from the 2026-27 Special Education Funding Table. Diocese of Brownsville school list and TEFA guidance from cdob.org; Workforce Solutions Lower Rio Grande Valley coverage from wfsolutions.org and the Texas child care office locator; South Texas College dual-credit rules from southtexascollege.edu and STC news; PSJA ISD dual-credit savings from psjaisd.us. Neither public source reports tuition.
Texas doesn't keep a registry of private schools, so we may have missed one. Tell us about it and we'll check the records and add it.
McAllen Edu Funding is a project of Boss Leads. We are not a school, the Texas Comptroller, Odyssey, the Catholic Diocese of Brownsville, South Texas College, Workforce Solutions, or a government agency.