Step Up For Students (SUFS)

Step Up For Students is a nonprofit scholarship funding organization (SFO) based in Jacksonville, FL¹, one of three organizations running Florida K-12 scholarship accounts in 2026-27. This school year it administers FES-EO, FTC and FES-UA, PEP (closed to new students), existing New Worlds Scholarship Accounts and the Transportation Stipend. Families apply, pay schools and providers, and ask for reimbursements in its online platform, EMA (Education Market Assistant). The programs themselves are created by Florida law; Step Up For Students runs the applications and accounts.

Programs Step Up For Students runs in 2026-27

The State Board of Education renewed Step Up For Students' approval for the FTC, New Worlds and Family Empowerment Scholarship programs⁵. PEP is part of the FTC program in state law, so the FTC approval covers it⁶.

Step Up For Students' handbook lets a student with a Hope Program notification form apply after the usual deadline¹³. Under state law, Hope is a referral into FES-EO or FTC, not a separate scholarship¹⁴; see the Hope Program page.

EMA, the Step Up For Students platform

Families sign in to EMA at apply.stepupforstudents.org³. Step Up For Students describes four ways scholarship money moves¹⁵:

• Private-school tuition: the school sends an invoice in EMA, and the school and the parent both approve it. Timing, in Step Up For Students' words: payment is initiated within 7 business days of school and parent approval; up to 5 business days to arrive¹⁶.
• Services such as tutoring or therapy: the family reserves funds through Find Providers, and the provider is paid directly after it delivers the service and sends an invoice.
• Products: the family orders from approved vendors in MyScholarShop, paid straight from the account.
• Reimbursement: the family pays first and uploads receipts; review takes up to 60 days¹⁷ after the paperwork is complete.

Our EMA guide explains MyScholarShop and Find Providers, and EMA login help covers sign-in problems.

Languages

Step Up For Students' website has English, Spanish and Haitian Creole⁴ versions. The Spanish and Haitian Creole pages are machine translations, and Step Up For Students says the English version governs if they differ¹⁸. It publishes separate 2026-27 Spanish handbooks, including Escuela Privada (FTC/FES-EO), FES-UA and PEP¹⁹, and Spanish how-to videos²⁰. The only human-translated Haitian Creole document we found it linking is an older edition of its FES-UA purchasing guide²¹.

How to apply

1. Create an account and apply in EMA, on Step Up For Students' own website³.
2. Apply for one scholarship at a time. Step Up For Students allows one active application per student²², and state law bars applying for FES and FTC for the same student at once²³.
3. If a new Private School Scholarship is awarded, accept it by December 15, 2026²⁴.

For documents and steps, see how to apply for a Florida K-12 scholarship and the deadlines calendar.

Contact

Step Up For Students' Customer Engagement Center answers at (877) 735-7837²⁵ (Mon-Fri 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. ET) and offers live chat and an online inquiry form. The Step Up For Students contact page lists the email and mailing addresses, with where each comes from.

The federal tax credit

State SFOs don't run the federal Education Freedom Tax Credit; scholarship granting organizations (SGOs) on a state list do²⁶. Step Up For Students set up a separate organization for it, Step Up, Step Further, which is not yet on a Florida SGO list²⁷. Florida's first list is due February 15, 2027²⁸. See the Education Freedom Tax Credit page.

The other scholarship organizations

Two other SFOs serve Florida K-12 families in 2026-27: AAA Scholarship Foundation and Sunshine State Kids Foundation. A family works with one SFO per student. See the side-by-side comparison of Florida scholarship organizations or all scholarship organizations.