Sending Districts Must Pay Tuition to Out‑of‑District Open Enrollment Schools Even Without Local Program Adoption (RSA 194‑D)

Introduction

In Appeal of Pittsfield School District, 2025 N.H. 46 (Oct. 17, 2025), the New Hampshire Supreme Court affirmed a decision of the State Board of Education requiring the Pittsfield School District (the District) to pay tuition for a resident student, E.A., to attend Prospect Mountain School, an open enrollment public school outside the District. The central question was whether a “sending” district must have formally adopted the State’s open enrollment statute—RSA chapter 194‑D—before it can be obligated to fund a pupil’s tuition to a “receiving” district’s open enrollment school.

The Court held that under RSA 194‑D, the obligation of a sending district to pay tuition to an authorized open enrollment receiving school does not depend on whether the sending district has adopted an open enrollment “program” under RSA 194‑D:3. The Court grounded its holding in the statutory text and structure, and it found that recent legislative amendments to RSA 194‑D confirmed and clarified this original legislative intent. This ruling has immediate implications for inter‑district enrollment, school district budgeting, and parental choice in New Hampshire’s public education system.

Summary of the Opinion

Applying de novo review to the State Board’s statutory interpretation, the Court concluded that:

RSA chapter 194‑D authorizes receiving districts to designate one or more of their schools as open enrollment schools and to accept applications from eligible pupils, including those residing outside the district.
Nothing in the statute conditions a sending district’s duty to pay tuition for an accepted pupil on the sending district’s separate adoption of an “open enrollment school program” under RSA 194‑D:3.
The Legislature’s 2025 amendments to RSA 194‑D—particularly to RSA 194‑D:1 (definitions), RSA 194‑D:5 (funding), and RSA 194‑D:6 (budget line item)—clarify and confirm that the sending district must pay tuition to an authorized receiving district’s open enrollment school at not less than 80% of the sending district’s average cost per pupil.

Accordingly, the Court affirmed the State Board’s decision requiring Pittsfield to pay E.A.’s tuition to Prospect Mountain School despite Pittsfield’s non‑adoption of RSA chapter 194‑D.

Analysis

Precedents Cited and Their Influence

Appeal of Rye School District, 173 N.H. 753 (2020): The Court referenced Rye for the standard governing judicial review of State Board decisions. Under RSA 541:13, agency decisions are upheld unless clearly unreasonable or unlawful; factual findings are presumed prima facie lawful and reasonable, while legal conclusions are reviewed de novo. This framework allowed the Court to independently interpret RSA 194‑D while still affording the State Board’s factual determinations their statutory presumption.
Appeal of Tower Hill Tavern, LLC, 177 N.H. ___, 2025 N.H. 41: Cited for core principles of statutory construction: start with plain language; give effect to every word; harmonize statutory parts; and do not add language the legislature did not include. These canons guided the Court’s rejection of the District’s argument that an undefined distinction between “open enrollment school” and “open enrollment program” limits the statute’s reach.
Bovaird v. N.H. Dep’t of Admin. Servs., 166 N.H. 755 (2014): The Court relied on Bovaird for the proposition that a subsequent statutory amendment that clarifies prior law is “strong evidence” of the Legislature’s original intent. This was pivotal: the Court treated the 2025 amendments to RSA 194‑D as clarifying (not substantively changing) the pre‑amendment obligations of sending districts.
Vogel v. Vogel, 137 N.H. 321 (1993) and Sup. Ct. R. 25(8): Cited for the Court’s practice of declining to reach additional arguments not necessary to the disposition once the primary interpretive question is resolved.

Legal Reasoning

The Court’s reasoning unfolded in three interrelated moves: textual analysis of the pre‑amendment statute, structural harmonization of RSA 194‑D’s provisions, and reliance on clarifying amendments enacted during the appeal.

1) Textual reading of RSA 194‑D (pre‑amendment)

Before the 2025 amendments, RSA 194‑D:1, I defined an “open enrollment public school” or “open enrollment school” as a public school that, in addition to serving in‑district pupils, chooses to accept pupils from other districts. RSA 194‑D:2, I authorized any school district’s legislative body to designate one or more of its schools as open enrollment schools. RSA 194‑D:2, IV allowed the district to predetermine the number of out‑of‑district pupils it would accept. RSA 194‑D:2, V permitted open enrollment schools to accept applications from “eligible pupils,” with “pupil” defined in RSA 194‑D:1, III as any child eligible to attend New Hampshire public schools who lives with a parent.

The phrase “open enrollment school program” appeared in RSA 194‑D:3, which sets procedures for a district to establish its own open enrollment schools. The District urged the Court to read this phrase as an essential precondition—requiring both sending and receiving districts to “adopt” RSA 194‑D before any tuition obligation arises. The Court rejected this reading. It held that the “program” language simply accommodates districts that designate more than one school as open enrollment; it does not impose a separate statewide adoption requirement on sending districts.

2) Harmonizing the scheme and refusing to add conditions not in the statute

The Court emphasized structural coherence. RSA 194‑D separates the roles of “receiving” and “sending” districts. Receiving districts choose whether to designate schools and how many out‑of‑district pupils to accept. Once a receiving school is authorized and accepts an eligible pupil, the funding provision—RSA 194‑D:5—assigns the fiscal responsibility to the sending district. Nothing in the text conditions this obligation on the sending district first adopting a local “program” under RSA 194‑D:3. Invoking Tower Hill Tavern’s directive not to add words to a statute, the Court refused to graft a non‑textual adoption prerequisite onto RSA 194‑D:5’s funding mandate.

3) Clarifying amendments in 2025 confirm original meaning

During the appeal, the Legislature enacted Laws 2025, ch. 211 (effective Sept. 13, 2025), amending RSA 194‑D. The Court ordered supplemental briefing on whether the amendments were clarifying or substantive and what effect they had. The Court concluded they clarified rather than changed prior law:

RSA 194‑D:1 (Definitions) — expanded terminology: The amendment confirms that “open enrollment school” includes “open enrollment program,” erasing any doubt that “program” is simply a label within the same category. This undermined the District’s argument that “program” imposed an independent adoption requirement on sending districts.
RSA 194‑D:5, I (Funding) — clarified parties and calculation: The prior text said the “pupil’s resident district shall pay” an open enrollment school “authorized by the school district.” The amendment adds precision: “For an open enrollment school authorized by a receiving school district, the pupil’s sending district shall pay the receiving district an amount equal to not less than 80 percent of the sending district’s average cost per pupil ….” The clarified terms “receiving” and “sending,” and the reference to the sending district’s average cost per pupil, confirm that the receiving district’s authorization triggers the sending district’s obligation, independent of any “program” adoption by the sending district.
RSA 194‑D:6 (Budget line item) — clarified budgeting practice: Previously, RSA 194‑D:6 required a budget line item for open enrollment tuition but did not frame it as a precondition to payment. The amendment clarifies that each school district must annually include a line item reflecting estimated expenditures for open enrollment school tuition and, correspondingly, offsetting revenue estimates from sending districts. The Court read this as a budgeting directive, not as a condition that could absolve a sending district of its duty to pay if the line item was not previously adopted.

Applying Bovaird, the Court treated these amendments as strong evidence of the original meaning: sending districts’ payment obligations attach when a receiving district has authorized an open enrollment school and accepts an eligible pupil; the sending district’s local “adoption” vote is not a prerequisite.

Impact

1) Statewide effect on sending districts

The decision forecloses a strategy by which sending districts might avoid tuition obligations by declining to adopt RSA 194‑D or by omitting an open enrollment line item from their budgets. Going forward:

Sending districts must pay at least 80% of their own average cost per pupil to the receiving district’s open enrollment school when a resident pupil is accepted.
Annual budgets must include a line item estimating open enrollment tuition obligations. Failure to have such a line item does not negate the obligation; it risks budget shortfalls and may necessitate mid‑year adjustments.
Districts should develop administrative processes to track applications, acceptances, and tuition billing cycles with receiving districts, and to forecast fiscal exposure.

2) Receiving districts and program design

Receiving districts retain discretion to designate one or more schools as open enrollment and to predetermine the number of out‑of‑district pupils to accept. The clarified funding mechanism provides a stable floor (80% of the sending district’s average cost per pupil), which aids receiving districts in financial planning and in setting capacity limits under RSA 194‑D:2, IV. The explicit reference to “receiving” and “sending” districts in RSA 194‑D:5 aligns financial responsibility with enrollment decisions and removes interpretive ambiguity.

3) Families and parental choice

The ruling advances parental choice by ensuring that an accepted pupil’s tuition is not contingent on the sending district’s political decision to adopt RSA 194‑D locally. Parents can expect that if their child is accepted to a receiving district’s authorized open enrollment school, the sending district’s statutory payment obligation will follow. The Court underscored this as one of the statute’s “threefold” purposes: supporting parental choice, creating a pathway for districts to authorize open enrollment schools, and designating funding sources.

4) Retroactivity and pending disputes
Because the 2025 amendments are deemed clarifying, they reflect and confirm what the law already meant under the prior text. That means sending districts were already obligated to pay under the pre‑amendment statute when a receiving district had authorized an open enrollment school and accepted an eligible pupil. Pending and recent disputes premised on a non‑adoption defense are unlikely to succeed.

5) Governance and administrative law

The decision affirms the State Board’s interpretive approach and clarifies the contours of agency and judicial roles. Courts will defer to agency fact‑finding but review statutory interpretation de novo, applying orthodox textual canons and, where applicable, treating subsequent clarifying amendments as reliable evidence of original meaning.

Complex Concepts Simplified

Sending district: The school district where the pupil resides. It is responsible for paying tuition to the receiving district’s open enrollment school when the pupil is accepted.
Receiving district: The district operating an authorized open enrollment school that accepts out‑of‑district pupils.
Open enrollment school vs. open enrollment program: An open enrollment school is a public school that accepts out‑of‑district pupils. “Open enrollment program” (in RSA 194‑D:3) refers to a district’s actions to establish one or more such schools within its own district. It does not impose a statewide adoption prerequisite on sending districts.
Average cost per pupil: A figure determined by the New Hampshire Department of Education using the sending district’s most recent data. Under RSA 194‑D:5, I, the sending district must pay not less than 80% of this amount to the receiving district.
Clarifying vs. substantive amendment: A clarifying amendment explains or makes explicit what the Legislature always intended; courts may rely on such an amendment to interpret the original statute. A substantive amendment changes the law going forward. Here, the Court treated the 2025 changes as clarifying the original meaning.
Standard of review: Agency factual findings are presumed lawful and reasonable; the challenger must show the decision is clearly unreasonable or unlawful (RSA 541:13). Statutory interpretation is reviewed de novo.
Legislative body of the school district: The entity (often town meeting or school district meeting) that may vote to designate one or more district schools as open enrollment schools under RSA 194‑D:2.

Conclusion

Appeal of Pittsfield School District resolves a previously contested question under RSA chapter 194‑D: a sending district’s obligation to fund a resident pupil’s tuition at an authorized open enrollment school in another district does not hinge on the sending district’s local adoption of an “open enrollment program.” The Court’s careful textual analysis, reinforced by clarifying legislative amendments, ensures statewide consistency: receiving districts control authorization and capacity; sending districts fund accepted placements at a floor of 80% of their average cost per pupil; and all districts must budget transparently for open enrollment tuition.

The decision strengthens parental choice, provides fiscal clarity for districts, and aligns administrative practice with statutory design. As New Hampshire’s open enrollment landscape evolves, this opinion will serve as a cornerstone precedent guiding school district governance, budgeting, and inter‑district collaboration under RSA 194‑D.