Full-Time Private Tutoring Programs That Accept Florida PEP (2026–27)

The School Choice Index · Last verified: August 13, 2026 · Program year: 2026–27

Yes — Florida PEP can pay for a full-time private tutoring program. But there’s a catch that costs families money, and almost nobody explains it.

Full-time private tutoring programs that accept Florida PEP do exist. But “full-time private tutoring” is not a product you shop for. It is a legal category in Florida law, under section 1002.43. To qualify, the person teaching your child must hold a current Florida teaching certificate for your child’s grade or subject. The program must cover 720 hours a year for grades K–3, or 900 hours for grades 4–12. The tutor must keep attendance records. And when PEP money is used, the tutor may teach no more than 5 students at once — or up to 25 in a qualifying facility.

Here’s the catch. A tutoring business can honestly say “we accept PEP” and still bill under a different rule — part-time tutoring, a home education instructional program, or another service category. Those can be legal, useful, and worth paying for. But they do not prove that the business is carrying your child’s full-time attendance under section 1002.43.

So the real question is not “who takes PEP?” It is “who can legally carry my child’s whole school day, under which category, and at what cost?”

We’ll show you four current open-web leads, exactly what their own sites prove and do not prove, how to check the legal category in about 15 minutes, what your county’s award buys per hour of teaching, and the one Florida program list that is public — because the full-time tutor list you are looking for is not.

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### Check a program before you pay: the 60-second screen A program passes the first screen only when you can answer yes to all six: 1. Category: Will this exact service be billed as a full-time private tutoring program under section 1002.43? 2. Teacher: Is the daily tutor’s Florida certificate current and valid for the grade or subjects taught? 3. Hours: Does the child’s real calendar reach 720 hours for K–3 or 900 hours for grades 4–12? 4. Attendance: Does the tutor keep a daily attendance register and make the required reports? 5. Group size: Is the group 5 or fewer, or no more than 25 in a qualifying facility? 6. Money: Which SFO holds the account, how will payment happen, and what will the family owe after the scholarship? Cost-gap formula: published annual price − your child’s 2026–27 county-and-grade award = your starting gap. This screen does not collect or save anything. The full seven-proof check and a copy-paste email are below.

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What we actually verified for this page

We read the source documents ourselves — not summaries of them.

• Florida law: sections 1002.43, 1002.394, 1002.395, and 1011.61, plus Rule 6A-1.045111
• Step Up For Students’ 2026–27 PEP Purchasing Guide — last modified August 4, 2026
• Step Up’s PEP Family Handbook and current funding schedule
• Step Up’s Full-Time Private Tutoring Provider Participation Agreement — the actual form a tutor signs
• AAA Scholarship Foundation’s 2026–27 Purchasing Handbook and current PEP page
• The Florida Department of Education’s 2026–27 SFO list, PEP FAQ, Private Schools Directory, and Educator Certification Lookup
• The official 2026–27 award chart, county by county
• The live public pages of the four programs named below, checked August 13, 2026

What we did not verify: we could not independently confirm that any specific business below is currently approved and billing a particular child as a full-time private tutoring program under section 1002.43. Where we name a program, we are telling you what its own website says, the date we checked, and what proof is still missing. That is a starting point for your questions — not a stamp of approval.

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Full-Time Private Tutoring Programs That Accept Florida PEP: 4 Current Leads

There is no public, statewide list filtered to full-time private tutoring programs under section 1002.43. Step Up families can search service providers inside the account-specific EMA marketplace. AAA runs PEP as reimbursement. Florida publishes public lists for other categories, including PEP Hybrid schools and approved online or virtual providers, but not a clean statewide list of full-time PEP tutors.

We want to be straight with you, because this is the whole reason the search feels frustrating.

You typed a search expecting a directory. There is not a public one that answers the legal question you are actually asking. Not because we did not look — because the public sources do not label and publish every section 1002.43 tutor in one place.

Step Up’s public catalog covers product vendors. Its service finder, where tutoring services appear, sits inside EMA and is tied to the student’s account. AAA tells PEP families to pay for an authorized expense and request reimbursement through its Scholarship Management Platform. Sunshine State Kids is listed by Florida as a 2026–27 SFO, but its public PEP payment route is not clear enough to state as fact here.

So here is what we did instead.

Four open-web leads — not four verified full-time PEP providers

We looked for Florida programs that publicly mention PEP, full-time or microschool-style instruction, and teacher-led learning. This table separates what the program says from what its public pages still do not prove. Checked August 13, 2026.

Read that table twice, because it proves the point of this page. Four leads, four different levels of proof. All four may offer real help. None of the public pages gives us enough documentation to label the business a verified full-time PEP tutoring program under section 1002.43.

Two of the pages also use “registered homeschooler” language. That may describe a separate service or a non-PEP student. It does not prove wrongdoing. But for a PEP family, it is a reason to stop and ask which legal route applies to your child before you sign.

That is not a knock on any of them. Providers write websites for parents, not for auditors. But it means “accepts PEP” is not a filter you can trust for this decision. You have to ask.

The one list Florida does publish

If you want a list you can open right now and browse by county, it exists — just for a different setup.

Florida’s Private Schools Directory includes a PEP Hybrid Schools filter. Step Up defines a PEP Hybrid school as a Florida-approved hybrid private school where a PEP student attends in person at least two full school days a week and the Student Learning Plan covers the remaining instructional time.

It is not full-time private tutoring. But it solves a similar problem — someone else teaching, in a building, on a schedule — and unlike the tutor category, it has a public filter.

One warning belongs beside that link: Florida says the directory data is submitted by private schools, is not independently verified by the department, and does not by itself mean state approval or accreditation. Use the PEP Hybrid filter as the official starting point, then confirm the school’s current PEP Hybrid status and payment route with your SFO.

Next step: Open the Florida Private Schools Directory, choose your county, and filter for PEP Hybrid Schools. Then confirm the exact 2026–27 status with the school and your SFO before paying.

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What makes a program “full-time private tutoring” under Florida law?

Florida law defines full-time private tutoring in section 1002.43. The tutor must hold a valid Florida teaching certificate for the subjects or grades taught, keep required records and reports, and provide the minimum annual attendance time. Current SFO guides translate that minimum into 720 instructional hours for grades K–3 and 900 hours for grades 4–12. When those conditions are met, the private tutoring program can satisfy Florida’s compulsory attendance requirement.

Four rules. That is the whole thing.

1. A real Florida teaching certificate. The statute says the tutor must hold “a valid Florida certificate to teach the subjects or grades” being taught. Not a degree. Not a tutoring certification. Not “a former teacher.” A current Florida certificate that covers your kid’s grade or subject.

2. The hours. Florida’s current school-year rules use 720 net instructional hours for K–3 and 900 net instructional hours for grades 4–12. A full-time tutoring program has to actually hit the number for the child it is serving.

Quick math so you can sanity-check any schedule:

That weekly math is just to help you spot a schedule that obviously does not add up. The program’s real calendar and net instructional time are what count.

3. Attendance records. This is the part nobody tells parents about.

We pulled the actual Full-Time Private Tutoring Provider Participation Agreement. The tutor agrees to keep an attendance register showing whether each student was present or absent for each school day and to keep the records open for inspection by the designated school representative or district superintendent.

Read that again. A real full-time tutoring program is signing up for daily attendance records that can be inspected. That is a serious commitment. It is also one of your best screening questions — ask how they keep attendance, and you will learn a lot from how fast they answer.

4. Paperwork with the scholarship organization. Step Up’s current guide says a full-time tutor must certify compliance with the law and file a W-9 with the appropriate SFO before receiving ESA funds, then annually after that. The participation agreement also asks for the tutor’s DOE number, certificate coverage, signatures, and facility information when the larger group rule is used.

One correction that matters: Step Up’s current full-time tutoring section does not say the tuition schedule must be public. That sentence appears immediately before the tutoring section, under approved pre-apprenticeship programs. AAA’s 2026–27 handbook does require full-time private tutoring tuition and fee schedules to be published. So a missing public price is a warning and an AAA problem, but it is not a universal Step Up disqualifier by itself.

What the tutor’s form actually asks for

Here is what is on that participation agreement, because it tells you exactly what to ask for:

• The scholarship student’s name
• The tutor’s full name
• The tutor’s DOE number
• The subjects the tutor is certified to teach
• The grade levels the tutor is certified to teach
• A certification that the student will receive 720 or 900 hours, as applicable
• A commitment to keep the daily attendance register and required records
• A signature from the tutor — and from a separate program administrator, when there is one
• A certificate of occupancy when the facility rule is being used for a larger group

One more detail most people miss: the tutor signs the form for the listed student. It is a per-child certification. That is why you verify the schedule and teacher for your child, not just the business in general.

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Does the tutor really need a Florida teaching certificate?

For full-time private tutoring under Florida PEP, the tutor must hold a current, valid Florida educator certificate covering the subject or grade taught. Part-time tutoring accepts a much wider set of credentials, including out-of-state certificates, subject-area degrees, approved training programs, and several ways to prove subject mastery. This difference is why many tutoring businesses can be paid by PEP for part-time work but cannot automatically carry a child’s full-time attendance.

Yes. And here is the comparison that explains almost everything confusing about this topic.

We pulled both credential lists out of Step Up’s 2026–27 PEP Purchasing Guide and put them side by side.

Eleven doors versus one.

That gap is the reason so many good tutoring companies market to PEP families but cannot automatically be your child’s section 1002.43 program. Their staff may clear one of the part-time doors, not the full-time one. A reading specialist with Orton-Gillingham training and fifteen years of experience can be PEP-payable for part-time tutoring. That same person cannot carry your child’s attendance under section 1002.43 unless the person also holds the required current Florida certificate.

This is not a quality judgment. Some of the best instructors in Florida sit on the part-time side of that table. It is a credential and attendance rule, and it only matters if you need someone to replace school, not supplement it.

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How many students can one full-time PEP tutor teach, and where?

Under Step Up’s and AAA’s current PEP rules, a full-time private tutor receiving scholarship funds may not serve more than five students at one time. The limit rises to 25 students in the qualifying facilities listed in section 1002.43, including a commercial building with a valid certificate of occupancy, a library, museum, performing-arts space, theater, cinema, church, certain public or college facilities, or a building recently used as a school or licensed childcare facility.

The statute itself creates the up-to-25 facility route. The current SFO guides add the five-student limit before that facility exception applies.

Five students unless the program is operating in the right kind of place. Then it can be up to 25.

Florida added the larger-facility option in 2023. It opened a path for larger tutoring groups without turning the tutor into a private school. Qualifying spaces include:

• A commercial building with a valid certificate of occupancy
• A library, museum, theater, cinema, or performing-arts space
• A community service facility
• A church
• A facility or land owned by a Florida College System institution or university
• A similar public institution facility
• A building recently used as a school or licensed childcare facility

In those spaces, section 1002.43 says the tutoring may operate within the facility’s existing zoning and land-use designation without a special exception, rezoning, or land-use change, as long as the program follows applicable health, safety, fire-safety, and building-safety rules.

Why this matters to your wallet more than to your paperwork: the group-size rule changes the economics. One teacher serving five or more children can spread the cost. One teacher serving only your child cannot.

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Will your Florida PEP money actually cover full-time tutoring?

The official 2026–27 Florida PEP award ranges from $7,463 to $12,217, depending on county of residence and grade level. Divided by the required instructional hours, that works out to about $8.29 to $16.97 per hour of teaching per child. The award is set by county and grade, not by the program’s price, so compare the award directly against every required charge before you enroll.

Now the part we would want someone to tell us.

What your award buys per hour

Take your county’s award. Divide it by 720 hours for K–3 or 900 hours for grades 4–12. That is what the scholarship equals per required hour if every dollar goes to the full-time tutoring bill.

Eight to seventeen dollars an hour. Private one-on-one tutoring in Florida does not normally run all day at eight to seventeen dollars an hour.

Here is our one honest warning

At the official award alone, PEP does not fund a market-rate private tutor who teaches only your child all day for 720 or 900 hours. It is not close.

Even the highest K–3 award in the state — $12,217 in Monroe County — equals $16.97 per required hour. The statewide low for grades 9–12 equals $8.29 per hour.

Now run the small-group math. At the Polk and Osceola award amounts used in the examples below, a tutor serving five children at exactly the scholarship amount would gross:

• $41,680 for five K–3 students
• $38,760 for five students in grades 4–8
• $37,805 for five students in grades 9–12

That is before self-employment taxes, insurance, space, supplies, unpaid planning, or time off. The National Education Association’s latest Florida figures put the average starting teacher salary at $49,435 and the average teacher salary at $56,663. Florida ranks 19th for starting salary and 50th among the 50 states plus the District of Columbia for average teacher salary.

To gross the $56,663 statewide average with five children, a tutor would need about $11,333 per child before expenses. That is above the PEP award in most Florida counties and grade bands.

If one-on-one teaching all day is your priority, PEP’s standard award is the wrong budget. For a child with a qualifying disability, check FES-UA before you build the plan around PEP. FES-UA can pay for a private tutoring program and specialized services, but eligibility requires a qualifying disability plus either an IEP or a diagnosis from one of the licensed professionals named in Florida law. A 504 plan by itself is not the FES-UA eligibility test.

But here is what the same law makes possible. Because one certified teacher can serve five children — or up to 25 in a qualifying facility — the small-group version can work. The public prices we found cluster close to the standard award, even though the public pages do not prove that those programs bill each child under section 1002.43.

Real published prices against real awards

We took the public prices from Kipe Academy and Taylor Success Learning and put them against the official 2026–27 award for the county and grade. This is cost math, not provider verification.

Look at the pattern. Both published totals land within $350 of the K–3 award — and both leave a gap for older children.

That does not prove the programs set their prices to the award. It proves something more useful: at these two published prices, the grade band alone flips the family from money left to money owed.

PEP pays less as the child gets older. A K–3 student in Polk County gets $8,336. A student in grades 9–12 in the same county gets $7,561. Same county, $775 less.

Nobody warns families about that. Budget for it.

These are math examples, not guarantees. A program’s published price is not proof that every charge is an approved expense. Your available balance depends on funding, prior spending, holds, documentation, and the SFO’s review.

Sample 2026–27 Florida PEP awards

All figures below were rechecked against the official county-and-grade chart on August 13, 2026.

Two K–3 children the same age, one in Monroe and one in Volusia, are separated by $3,979 a year.

Run your own numbers: Find your child’s county-and-grade award in the official 2026–27 chart. Subtract it from every required program charge, then divide any remaining balance by the number of payments the contract requires.

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Who actually pays the tutor — Step Up, AAA, Sunshine State Kids, or you?

Payment depends on the scholarship funding organization, or SFO, that holds the account. Step Up supports direct payment to participating providers through EMA and parent reimbursement. AAA’s published PEP process is reimbursement-based: the family pays first, then submits the expense. Florida lists Sunshine State Kids as a third approved SFO for 2026–27, but its public PEP payment route is not clear enough to rely on without written instructions.

This one surprises people more than the price does.

Florida’s Department of Education lists three approved scholarship funding organizations for 2026–27: Step Up For Students, AAA Scholarship Foundation, and Sunshine State Kids. The state tells families to contact the SFO to determine which programs it administers.

If you are with AAA and a program wants annual tuition up front, you may need to front about $8,000 of your own money and then request reimbursement. That is not a hidden fee. It is the cash-flow consequence of reimbursement. It is the kind of thing you want to know before the contract becomes nonrefundable.

Money in versus money out

PEP funds arrive in four quarterly pieces, not one lump sum.

Step Up’s current schedule says the SFO receives first-quarter funds on August 1 for renewal students and September 1 for new students, followed by November 1, February 1, and April 1. Step Up says funds are credited to the student’s account within two weeks after it receives them.

AAA publishes September 1, November 1, February 1, and April 1, subject to change.

Programs may want registration fees, deposits, or the first payment before the account is funded. Put the real dates beside the contract before you sign:

That table is not a promise about when a reimbursement clears. It is the earliest money-in schedule published by the SFOs. Review time, missing documents, holds, and available balance still matter.

What a Step Up full-time tutoring invoice has to include

Step Up’s current family handbook lists the required fields for a full-time tutoring invoice or receipt on business letterhead:

• The scholarship student’s first and last name
• The tutor’s first and last name
• The tutor’s Florida Department of Education certification number
• The tutor’s company name, if there is one
• The service period
• The tutor’s hourly rate
• The total amount due
• The payment method
• A clear statement that the request is for full-time tutoring

A first-time tutor may also need the participation agreement, W-9, and proof of credentials.

Notice what is sitting right there in the invoice requirements: the DOE certification number. A real full-time tutor already needs that number for the scholarship paperwork. If a program cannot tell you whose number goes on the invoice, it has not answered the most basic full-time question.

Before you sign anything, ask five money questions: Which SFOs do you work with right now? What exact service category will be used for my child? Do you bill directly or do I pay first? Which charges are outside the scholarship? What happens if the SFO denies or delays a payment?

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Is a “microschool” the same as a full-time private tutoring program?

No. “Microschool” describes a small learning setting, not a legal attendance or payment category. A Florida microschool may operate as a full-time private tutoring program, a home education instructional program, a PEP Hybrid private school, a part-time tutoring provider, or something else. The label does not tell you who carries attendance, which credentials apply, or how PEP will pay.

The word “microschool” tells you the room is small. That is all it tells you.

Two programs on the same street can both call themselves microschools and operate under completely different rules — with completely different answers to “is my kid legally covered?”

Here is the full map. This is the table we wish existed when we started digging.

A rule that catches people: do not treat the same service as both a home education instructional program and a full-time private tutoring program. Step Up’s current home education instructional program section says other live instruction must meet the part-time tutoring rules, while full-time private tutoring has its own separate category and paperwork.

And on part-time, Florida law says it plainly: part-time tutoring does not qualify as regular school attendance. Families using it meet attendance through the parent-directed PEP route or another qualifying route.

That sentence is worth a fortune. If you buy 25 hours a week of services labeled part-time and think the provider has taken over the attendance job, it has not. You are still directing the PEP unless another legal route clearly applies.

What about PEP Hybrid, exactly?

A PEP Hybrid school is a Florida-approved hybrid private school program for PEP students. The child attends the physical location at least two full school days each week. The Student Learning Plan addresses the remaining instructional time.

That is the whole idea. Your child gets a regular in-person schedule without becoming an ordinary full-time private school student. Full-time enrollment at a traditional private school is not the PEP lane; that is where FTC or FES-EO private-school funding may fit instead.

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Can a full-time Florida PEP tutoring program be online?

Not as an ordinary online full-time tutoring arrangement. Step Up’s 2026–27 guide says PEP funds may not pay for full-time online instruction. AAA allows full-time online instruction only when it is through a Florida Department of Education-approved Virtual Instruction Program provider. Both SFOs route approved online or virtual programs through a separate category from a normal section 1002.43 tutor.

Be careful here, because the word “online” can describe three different purchases.

• Self-paced, prerecorded course: curriculum or stand-alone online class rules may apply.
• Live online class or part-time tutoring: the approved online-provider or part-time tutoring rules may apply, depending on the SFO and format.
• Full-time online instruction: Step Up prohibits it. AAA permits it only through an FLDOE-approved Virtual Instruction Program provider that meets section 1002.45(2)(a).

Step Up also says credentialed providers such as tutors may deliver services virtually. That does not erase the separate rule against full-time online instruction. It means virtual delivery can work for a permitted service category, especially part-time tutoring, without turning an ordinary online tutor into a full-time virtual program.

The clean answer: if you want online and full-time, start with Florida’s approved online or virtual provider route and your SFO’s current guide. Do not pay an ordinary tutor for a fully online 720- or 900-hour plan and assume the full-time tutor category will cover it.

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How do you check a full-time PEP tutoring program before you pay?

Verification means checking the legal category and the individual tutor — not just the business name. A real full-time private tutoring setup should be able to name the tutor, show current Florida certificate coverage, show a calendar that reaches 720 or 900 hours, explain daily attendance records, put every charge in writing, and tell you exactly how your SFO will pay.

This is the part that saves families thousands of dollars. It takes about 15 minutes.

The seven proofs

Ask for these. In this order.

1. The exact category. Ask: “When you bill PEP for my child, what service category will show in the portal or reimbursement request?”

The answer you need is full-time private tutoring under section 1002.43. A vague “we take PEP” is your signal to keep asking.

2. The tutor’s name. Not the founder. Not the director. The person responsible for your child’s daily instruction.

3. The tutor’s DOE certification number and current certificate. Ask for both. The number appears on Step Up’s full-time tutoring paperwork and invoice requirements.

4. The subjects and grades on that certificate. A certificate has coverage limits. Make sure the certificate matches what the tutor will actually teach your child. If more than one teacher will cover the day, check each one.

5. A calendar that reaches 720 or 900 hours. Ask the program to show the math using your child’s real schedule. Days times instructional hours per day. Do not count lunch, pickup time, optional clubs, or days your child will not attend unless the program can show why those hours count.

6. How attendance is recorded. A full-time tutor should be able to describe a daily register and required reports without guessing. Ask who keeps it, what happens after an absence, and whether your child’s actual schedule is the schedule being certified.

7. The complete price and payment terms in writing. Get tuition, registration, deposits, curriculum, supplies, technology, late fees, withdrawal terms, refund rules, and charges PEP may not cover. AAA’s current handbook requires a full-time tutor’s tuition and fee schedule to be published and publicly available. Step Up’s current full-time tutoring section does not state that same public-posting rule, but you still need the total price in writing before you sign.

If the group is bigger than five, add an eighth proof: ask which qualifying-facility rule the program is using, how many students will be present at once, and whether the required certificate of occupancy and safety requirements are in place.

Can you check the Florida teaching certificate yourself?

Florida’s Department of Education page labels its tool Educator Certification Lookup and says it can search the certification status of any teacher currently certified in Florida. When we opened the state link on August 13, 2026, it resolved to a FLDOE licensing login page, so we could not confirm a no-login public search from outside.

Use both routes:

1. Ask the tutor for the full name, DOE certification number, and a copy of the current certificate.
2. Open Florida’s Educator Certification Lookup from the state Teaching page and search when the public lookup is available to you.
3. Compare the status, expiration date, grades, and subject coverage with the job the tutor will do.

A screenshot of a certificate is not enough by itself if the name, date, or coverage does not match. And a program’s business approval does not replace the individual tutor’s certificate.

A tutor who will not tell you whose Florida certificate carries the program has told you something.

Copy this and send it

Paste this into an email. It is polite, specific, and hard to answer with marketing language.

Hi — I’m considering your program for my child using the Florida PEP scholarship. Before we enroll, could you confirm a few things? 1. What exact PEP service category will you use for my child? 2. Do you currently work with Step Up For Students, AAA Scholarship Foundation, Sunshine State Kids, or more than one? 3. What is the name and Florida DOE certification number of each tutor responsible for my child’s daily instruction? Which grades and subjects does each certificate cover? 4. How many instructional hours are on my child’s annual calendar, and how do you keep daily attendance? 5. How many students will be taught at one time, and what type of location will be used? 6. Do you bill the scholarship directly, or do I pay first and request reimbursement? Could you also send the complete current tuition and fee schedule, refund and withdrawal policy, school-year calendar, and a list of charges PEP may not cover? Thank you.

Save the reply. If an answer changes during a tour or phone call, ask the program to put the new answer in writing.

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What does choosing full-time private tutoring close off?

Full-time private tutoring under section 1002.43 fits the PEP route and can fit FES-UA for an eligible student with a disability. It does not fit the ordinary FES-EO private-school lane at the same time. Florida law makes a student ineligible for FES-EO while participating in a section 1002.43 private tutoring program unless the student qualifies through the disability pathway.

Here is a fact we have not seen explained clearly elsewhere, and it is worth two minutes of your time.

Florida law lists a private tutoring program under section 1002.43 as an authorized scholarship expense. The same Family Empowerment Scholarship law says a student is not eligible for the ordinary FES-EO pathway while participating in that private tutoring program, unless the student is eligible through the FES-UA disability pathway.

The Florida Tax Credit law draws the other side of the line: private tutoring normally blocks FTC scholarship eligibility unless the student is enrolled in PEP.

In plain terms: section 1002.43 tutoring is a valid funded route inside PEP, but it is not something you stack on top of ordinary private-school scholarship status.

Why you should care: if you are weighing “full-time tutor under PEP” against “full-time private school under FTC or FES-EO,” those are different attendance lanes. You can change lanes when your family’s plan changes. Do not assume you can hold both at the same time.

You also stop being a registered district home education student

This is where families can follow the wrong rulebook.

A PEP student is not a registered home education student. PEP is parent-directed education, but it is a separate legal route. Florida’s PEP FAQ says a student may not be registered with the school district as a home education student and registered in PEP at the same time.

If you already filed a home education notice with your district, use your SFO’s current instructions to end that registration when you move into PEP. Do not keep both open because a provider’s website calls its students “homeschoolers.”

What a PEP parent owes each year includes:

• A Student Learning Plan submitted to the SFO
• An approved national norm-referenced test or the statewide assessment, with results submitted as required
• A sworn compliance statement

A full-time tutor may keep the attendance records for the section 1002.43 program. The parent still has the PEP duties. Hiring a full-time tutor does not hand the entire scholarship account to the tutor.

Before the next funding date: open your SFO account and confirm the scholarship type, student status, Student Learning Plan, and any missing parent task. Two minutes now can prevent a payment problem later.

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What if there is no full-time PEP tutoring program near you?

Do not force an unverified program into the full-time tutor category. Florida PEP families can still satisfy attendance through the parent-directed PEP route, a listed PEP Hybrid private school, or another allowed route. Part-time tutoring can fill a skill gap, and an approved online or virtual provider may solve the location problem without pretending to be an ordinary full-time tutor.

Please do not pick an unverified program just because it is the only one within driving distance. That is how families pay for something that does not do the job they thought it did.

Here is who should go a different direction.

You need coverage while you work. This is the real question behind many searches for “full-time.” Prioritize the schedule over the label. Ask about drop-off, pickup, closures, holidays, lunch, supervision outside teaching hours, whether a parent must stay, and transportation. A program can meet the tutoring rules and still leave you stranded at 2:15 p.m.

You live in a rural county. Check the state’s PEP Hybrid filter and approved online or virtual providers. A Florida-certified teacher you already know may also be able to serve a small group under the full-time tutor rules. That does not make setup automatic — the teacher, calendar, attendance, group size, SFO paperwork, and payment route still have to work.

Your child has a qualifying disability. Check FES-UA before assuming PEP is the best funding lane. FES-UA eligibility requires a qualifying disability plus an IEP or a diagnosis from a professional Florida law accepts. A 504 plan by itself is not the eligibility rule. Then compare the award, allowed expenses, services, and provider fit for your child.

Your child needs transportation, lunch, sports, clubs, or a full campus. Many small tutoring programs do not offer those things. That is not a footnote. It can decide whether the year works. A PEP Hybrid school or a full-time private school scholarship route may fit better.

You only need reading, math, language, or test help. Then you may not need the full-time category at all. Part-time tutoring has far more credential paths and no 720- or 900-hour requirement. Keep directing the PEP and buy the help your child actually needs.

Next step: See our Florida PEP approved-provider guide to match the purchase you need with the right expense category before you pay.

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What can go wrong with Florida PEP full-time tutoring?

The biggest problems are not always bad teaching. They are enrolling under the wrong expense category, assuming direct payment when reimbursement is required, paying charges the scholarship will not cover, missing the 720/900-hour math, or treating a supplemental program as the legal full-time route.

Six things we would watch for.

The program takes PEP, but not as full-time private tutoring. The expense may still be payable. Your child’s attendance may still be parent-directed. Fix: get the exact category in writing.

You front more cash than you planned. Add the deposit, registration, first tuition payment, curriculum, and supplies. Then subtract the money actually available in the account at that time. With AAA, plan around reimbursement unless AAA tells you otherwise in writing.

Your child is still enrolled full time in a public school or charter school. PEP does not mix with full-time public enrollment. Florida law includes charter schools in that public-school rule. Contracted public-school classes bought part time are different and may be allowed.

The certified tutor leaves in November. Ask now who replaces that person and whether the replacement certificate covers the same grades and subjects. A business name does not carry the certificate. A person does.

The schedule does not reach 720 or 900 hours. Do the multiplication yourself. Every time. A long day on a brochure does not prove the annual instructional total.

The award does not cover the bill. This is common for older grades in the real examples above. The award can also be lower than the listed annual amount if the account is only partly funded, the student starts late, or the family has already spent some of the balance.

A program can be caring, safe, and academically strong and still be the wrong legal or financial fit for your child. That is not an attack on the program. It is why the category matters.

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How we researched this page

We used primary sources first: current Florida statutes, the state instructional-hour rule, the 2026–27 Step Up PEP Purchasing Guide, Step Up’s family and provider materials, the full-time tutor participation agreement, AAA’s 2026–27 handbook and PEP page, Florida Department of Education program pages, the 2026–27 SFO list, the PEP Hybrid directory filter, and the official county-and-grade award chart.

We also checked the 2026 legislative session. The enacted scholarship-related change in Chapter 2026-33 changed where certain closed-account FTC funds revert; it did not change the section 1002.43 certificate, attendance, hour, or facility rules used on this page.

The hour math, award-per-hour figures, five-student tutor economics, and award-versus-price comparisons are our own calculations from the cited official amounts. We show the inputs so you can check them.

What a program’s website proves: what the business publicly said on the date we checked.

What it does not prove: the current category used for your child, the certificate of the person teaching, the real annual calendar, whether a specific request will be paid, or whether a seat is open.

That is why we do not call any named business “verified” based on its own marketing. A provider would need to pass the seven-proof check with current documents before we would use that label, and the verification would need a date.

How The School Choice Index operates: Our coverage, content, inclusion, labels, verification, rankings, badges, and result order cannot be bought. Schools and programs may pay a flat monthly fee only for introductions a parent chooses to request. Payment never changes what we write, who appears, or where a result appears. No payment affected the inclusion or treatment of any program named on this page.

Found something out of date? Tell us. Scholarship guides and provider details can change during the school year, and we would rather fix a verified change fast than leave an old answer live.

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Florida PEP full-time tutoring: quick answers

Can Florida PEP pay for a full-time private tutor? Yes. Florida law and current SFO guides allow tuition and fees for a private tutoring program under section 1002.43. The tutor and arrangement still have to meet the rules, and the account needs enough available money.

Does a full-time PEP tutor need a Florida teaching certificate? Yes. The tutor needs a current, valid Florida certificate for the subjects or grades taught. This is much stricter than part-time tutoring.

How many hours count as full time? 720 hours a year for grades K–3 and 900 hours for grades 4–12.

How many children can one full-time PEP tutor teach? Current Step Up and AAA materials use a five-student limit for the ordinary full-time tutoring setup and allow up to 25 in a qualifying facility. Confirm the location, certificate of occupancy, group size, and SFO paperwork before enrolling.

Is a microschool automatically a full-time private tutoring program? No. “Microschool” is a description, not a Florida attendance or PEP expense category. Ask what category the program will use for your child.

Can an online tutor be my child’s full-time program? Not as an ordinary fully online full-time tutor arrangement. Step Up prohibits full-time online instruction. AAA allows full-time online instruction only through an FLDOE-approved Virtual Instruction Program provider. Part-time virtual tutoring is a different question.

Does Step Up pay the tutor directly? Step Up can pay an approved provider through EMA, and it can reimburse a parent. Ask the program which route it currently uses for full-time tutoring.

Does AAA pay the tutor directly? AAA’s public PEP page describes PEP as reimbursement: the parent pays first and requests repayment through AAA’s platform.

What about Sunshine State Kids? Florida lists Sunshine State Kids as an approved 2026–27 scholarship-funding organization. Its public materials did not give us enough detail to state a full-time tutoring payment route here. Ask Sunshine State Kids for the current process in writing before paying.

Will PEP cover the whole cost? Sometimes. The official 2026–27 award ranges from $7,463 to $12,217 by county and grade. The two full-price examples we found fit close to the K–3 award in Polk and Osceola but leave a gap for grades 4–8.

Can a PEP student attend a public or charter school full time? No. Florida law treats a charter school as a public school for this rule. Part-time contracted classes purchased through the PEP account are different.

Is PEP the same as registered Florida home education? No. Both can look like learning at home, but they are separate legal routes. A child cannot be registered with the district as a home education student and registered in PEP at the same time.

Are 2026–27 PEP applications still open? The regular 2026–27 Step Up application window closed April 30, 2026. Florida law requires SFOs to let a student in foster care or out-of-home care, or a dependent child of a U.S. Armed Forces member, apply at any time. Funding is still subject to eligibility and available scholarship funds. The 2026–27 PEP program limit is 140,000 students.

Can two siblings use the same tutor? Possibly. Each child has a separate scholarship account, paperwork, award, and attendance record. Both children count toward the tutor’s group-size limit while taught at the same time.

What if a program is not in the Step Up provider marketplace? That does not prove the expense is allowed or forbidden across every SFO. Ask the SFO what category applies, whether direct pay or reimbursement is available, and which documents are required before you pay.

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The bottom line

If you want someone else to teach your child every day using Florida PEP, you are looking for one of two clear setups: a full-time private tutoring program under section 1002.43 with the right Florida-certified tutor, real hours, and real attendance records — or a PEP Hybrid school, which Florida gives you a public filter to find.

Part-time tutors, home education instructional programs, online classes, and other services can be useful, excellent, and worth paying for. But the label “accepts PEP” does not prove that one of them has taken over the full-time section 1002.43 job.

Ask the seven questions. Check the certificate. Check the hours. Compare every written charge with your county award before you fall in love with a program. And if the numbers or rules do not work, that is information, not failure — there is another route, and it may fit your family better.

You are not behind. You are being careful. That is the right instinct here.

Start with the 60-second screen at the top, then use the copy-paste email before you pay a deposit.

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The School Choice Index is an independent comparison and research resource for U.S. school choice programs. This page explains current program rules and does not guarantee eligibility, acceptance, funding, reimbursement, approval of an expense, availability, or any educational outcome. Confirm the current category, documents, payment route, and available balance with your scholarship-funding organization before enrolling or paying.

Primary and first-party sources

• Florida Statutes, section 1002.43 — Private tutoring programs
• Florida Statutes, section 1002.394 — Family Empowerment Scholarship Program
• Florida Statutes, section 1002.395 — Florida Tax Credit Scholarship and PEP
• Florida Statutes, section 1011.61 — School-year and instructional-hour definitions
• Florida Administrative Code Rule 6A-1.045111
• Step Up For Students — Personalized Education Program
• Step Up For Students — 2026–27 PEP Purchasing Guide
• Step Up For Students — PEP Family Handbook
• Step Up For Students — Full-Time Private Tutor Participation Agreement
• Step Up For Students — PEP Hybrid Eligible Private School External Guide
• Step Up For Students — Official 2026–27 FTC/FES-EO/PEP Award Amounts
• AAA Scholarship Foundation — Florida Personalized Education Program
• AAA Scholarship Foundation — 2026–27 Purchasing Handbook
• Florida Department of Education — Scholarship Funding Organizations
• Florida Department of Education — Private Schools Directory
• Florida Department of Education — Teaching and Educator Certification Lookup
• Chapter 2026-33, Laws of Florida
• National Education Association — Educator Pay Data 2026