Hope credit (or similar) for elementary education?

Jonathan Kamens · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 130

My mother-in-law, who works as a financial aid counselor for a
non-profit, claims that private elementary school tuition is eligible
for the Hope credit.

My reading of Publication 970 would seem to suggest to me that this is
not the case, i.e., that the Hope and Lifetime Learning credits are
available only for post-secondary education.

Who's right?

On the other hand, it appears that I could open a Coverdell ESA and use
the funds from it to pay for elementary school tuition, but seeing as
how I don't exactly have any extra cash lying around and would thus
have to borrow the money and pay interest on it, that would seem to
defeat the purpose and probably not be worth the effort. With suitably
creative investment strategies, I imagine that I could make a higher
rate of return in the ESA than I'd be paying in loan interest, but it'd
be a lot of work and a lot of risk.

Thanks.

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Archived from group: misc>taxes>moderated

Phil Marti · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 2520

"Jonathan Kamens" wrote:

> My mother-in-law, who works as a financial aid counselor for a
> non-profit, claims that private elementary school tuition is eligible
> for the Hope credit.
>
> My reading of Publication 970 would seem to suggest to me that this is
> not the case, i.e., that the Hope and Lifetime Learning credits are
> available only for post-secondary education.
>
> Who's right?

You are, but you may not want to share that information with your MIL.

--
Phil Marti
Clarksburg, MD

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Paul Thomas, CPA · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 3094

"Jonathan Kamens" wrote
> My mother-in-law, who works as a financial aid counselor for a
> non-profit, claims that private elementary school tuition is eligible
> for the Hope credit.

Ummmm......no.

See below.......

> My reading of Publication 970 would seem to suggest to me that this is
> not the case, i.e., that the Hope and Lifetime Learning credits are
> available only for post-secondary education.
>
> Who's right?

Pub 970 of course.

> On the other hand, it appears that I could open a Coverdell ESA and use
> the funds from it to pay for elementary school tuition,

People often get confused about lots of things. Maybe this is one case
where she mis-remembered something.

--
Paul A. Thomas, CPA
Athens, Georgia

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removeps-groups · Joined: 09 Dec 2007 Posts: 98

On Feb 26, 12:27 pm, j...@kamens.brookline.ma.us (Jonathan Kamens)
wrote:

> I don't exactly have any extra cash lying around

Most of us will be getting a stimulus check soon. You can use that
for education expenses. FYI, the link to the publication is
http://www.irs.gov/publications/p970/

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Jonathan Kamens · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 130

"removeps-groups@yahoo.com" writes:
>Most of us will be getting a stimulus check soon. You can use that
>for education expenses.

That would be nice, but I will instead be using that to pay
off part of the home equity line balance I am already carrying.

(This has stopped being about taxes and started being about
the challenge of putting five children through private school,
and hence this particular sub-thread should probably end here.)

--
Help stop the genocide in Darfur!
http://www.genocideintervention.net/

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Dick Adams · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 25

Private school K-12 is no deductible
I would like for it to be deductible because
that would mean more tax revenue per student
in public education.

Quality of education is not a function of tax
revenue per student. But excess tax revenue
per student can purchase quality administrative
leadership in public education unless the
nitwit school boards hire other nitwits with
ED degrees or Ph.D. Liberal Arts degrees (AKA
retail sales degrees).

INrarelyHO, the problem in the American Education
system is the lack of reproductive organs in the
administration.

I support vouchers for inner-city children who
are unable to read at the grade level below to
the grad level to which they have been promoted.

If you are teacher and you choose not to fail a
student, you ain't nothin more than a bag man
stealin from yer employer.

Dick

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tobe · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 16

Dick Adams wrote:
> I support vouchers for inner-city children who
> are unable to read at the grade level below to
> the grad level to which they have been promoted.

Since you want to stray from taxes...

This is an extremely naive view of inner city schools, and the many
dedicated teachers there who try to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear
- and occasionally succeed. A kindergarten teacher I once knew and
respected greatly told me she was almost certain she could predict which
students would not graduate from high school within one week of the
beginning of kindergarten. Education is NOT simply the product of which
teachers a student is assigned to and which schools a student attends.
It is a complex mix of factors, the most important of which is what the
child has been and will be exposed to at home, both positively and
negatively.

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Kurt Ullman · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 16

In article ,
tobe wrote:

> It is a complex mix of factors, the most important of which is what the
> child has been and will be exposed to at home, both positively and
> negatively.

Although there are some early suggestions that that may not be really
true. There are a couple of charter schools in Indy, for instance, who
specialize in "problem children" taking those who have been tossed out
of the Public Schools. They have shown interesting increases in testing
scores in both the state tests and others such as reading levels.
Neither have really been around long enough to be anything more than
interesting, but that was more than was expected when they started.

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Harlan Lunsford · Joined: 25 Aug 2007 Posts: 790

tobe wrote:
> Dick Adams wrote:
>> I support vouchers for inner-city children who are unable to read at
>> the grade level below to
>> the grad level to which they have been promoted.
>
> Since you want to stray from taxes...
>
> This is an extremely naive view of inner city schools, and the many
> dedicated teachers there who try to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear
> - and occasionally succeed. A kindergarten teacher I once knew and
> respected greatly told me she was almost certain she could predict which
> students would not graduate from high school within one week of the
> beginning of kindergarten. Education is NOT simply the product of which
> teachers a student is assigned to and which schools a student attends.
> It is a complex mix of factors, the most important of which is what the
> child has been and will be exposed to at home, both positively and
> negatively.
>
Since I'm a former teacher (one year high school way back when, and when
I had definite opinions on who should or not teach), I COULD add to this
obviously off topic and NON TAX related issue...... but I won't.

But more to the topic, 20 years ago, well, even 10 maybe?, when a
client would ask if college tuition is deductible, I would say: "Not
just NO, but hell no. It'll never happen."

But then HOPE springs eternal, and now we have the HOPE credit; and 20%
LEC, and then their's tuition deduction for first 4000$. oh, yes, and
deduction for student loan interest.

What's next, a deduction for private school tuition?
(shudder)

ChEAr$,
Harlan Lunsford, EA n LA

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