The tour went well. Then you drove home at 4:30 on a Thursday and did the arithmetic: 22 miles, a toll road, and a pickup time that lands in the middle of your workday. For plenty of Dallas families, the distance between a school that fits and a school that works is one car and one driver.
Transportation is on the Texas Education Freedom Accounts expense list. It is also the thinnest category in the local marketplace by a wide margin. Both facts matter before you commit to a campus on the other side of the metro.
It is an approved expense, with two strings attached
The program's family rules list transportation to and from approved providers under its other approved expenses, alongside tutoring, assessments, therapies and meals served at a private school. So a paid ride to a participating school or to an approved tutor is a legitimate use of the account.
Two conditions narrow it. First, the money moves only one way: the Comptroller's office says every payment must be made through the program's secure online portal, and the June announcement that opened the marketplace was blunt about the consequence: nothing bought outside it gets reimbursed. Second, the account may not pay a family member. A neighbor's teenager driving your kids for gas money, or a grandparent doing the morning run, cannot be billed to the account — the first because they are not an approved vendor, the second because of the family rule.
Four providers across six counties
Our provider directory for the six-county Dallas area lists 391 approved tutors, therapists and vendors based in the metro, as the state finder showed them on October 12, 2026. Four of them list transportation: a non-emergency medical transport company in Dallas, a scheduled student-ride service in Richardson, a microschool in DeSoto that moves its own students, and a Rockwall seller that bundles educational transportation with other services.
Four, against 136 approved tutoring providers and 126 therapy providers in the same six counties. The shortage is not a Dallas quirk. When the marketplace went live on July 1 it held upward of 54,000 cleared listings from close to 2,400 sellers statewide, and the categories filled unevenly — ride services were barely represented anywhere.
What families are actually doing
Three patterns show up. Carpools arranged through the school, which cost nothing and touch the account not at all. A paid driver found privately and paid privately, outside the program. And choosing a closer school, which is how the drive quietly shapes the decision the account was supposed to open up.
Public transit is the fourth option and it is cheaper than most parents expect. DART's reduced-fare GoPass Tap card takes 50 percent off the public fare on buses, rail and the TRE. Children aged 5 to 14 can apply during the school term; high school students can apply with a valid DART service-area high school ID or a DART-issued student ID. Children under 5 ride free with an adult paying a fare, up to two children. Applications are online, with identity and eligibility verification.
A transit pass bought directly from DART, though, is a purchase made outside the marketplace. Treat it as a household expense and keep the account for items that clear the portal.
The October deposit changed the timing
Private school accounts are not funded in one lump. The Comptroller's office releases a quarter of the award on July 1, a second quarter on October 1 and the balance — half the total — on February 1, 2027, so long as the student is still enrolled somewhere participating. Half of a $10,474 account — about $5,237 — has been released so far this year. Homeschool and other non-enrolled students got their full $2,000 on July 1 instead.
If tuition took the first two installments, as it does for most families, a monthly ride contract is easier to fit against the February half than against what is left now. What you do not spend carries forward while the child remains in the program, so there is no penalty for waiting until the larger deposit lands. Our TEFA calculator will show what the installments look like against a specific tuition figure.
If your driver is not listed, ask them to apply
The vendor side is more open than most parents realize. Providers and vendors can apply at any time and applications are accepted on a rolling basis; the Comptroller's office vets both the applicant and every item it wants to list before anything shows up for sale. There are no fees to list, buy or sell. A vendor already cleared for the state's PDSES program carries that approval across, provided it keeps its good standing with the Texas Education Agency and is registered to do business with the Secretary of State.
That makes a reasonable ask of an established local service: no listing fee, a rolling application, and a few hundred Dallas-area families who would book immediately. A church van program or an after-school shuttle that already runs the route is the most likely candidate.
Before you say yes to a campus across town
Ask the admissions office for a carpool roster by ZIP code before you sign anything — most schools keep one and few mention it. Price the drive at your real hourly cost, not at mileage. Check whether the tutor or therapist you will need is approved near your house rather than near the school, since that is the trip you will make twice a week for years. And read the full list of what a TEFA account pays for so the ride is budgeted against everything else competing for the same $10,474, the way uniforms already are.
The program will cover the ride. In Dallas, for now, it is on you to find someone approved to sell it.
Sources
- Texas Education Freedom Accounts — Families (approved expenses, family-member rule)
- Texas Comptroller: Nearly 73,000 Texas Education Freedom Accounts to Receive Initial Funding July 1 (installment schedule, marketplace launch)
- Texas Comptroller: Comptroller Don Huffines Announces 100,000 Students Receiving Texas Education Freedom Accounts
- Texas Education Freedom Accounts — Providers and Vendors
- DART Reduced Fares