The Iowa tuition and textbook credit is a tax credit available on Iowa tax returns for qualifying expenses paid for K-12 education of a taxpayers’ dependents.
Almost any expense counts toward the credit. I went into more detail in this blog post from 2013.
I generally tell people that only expenses paid to a public school, or to a school that doesn’t teach religious doctrines, count toward the credit. The law says expenses paid to a school that teaches religious doctrines don’t count toward the credit.
However, I’ve had discussions with the Iowa Department of Revenue where I’ve been told that expenses paid to a school that teaches religious doctrines could count if you can separate out costs for general classroom expenses versus the cost of things that relate toward the teaching of religious doctrines.
I take this to mean that school supplies (notebooks, pens, etc.) would probably count, but tuition probably wouldn’t. I’ll write more about this in a future blog post.
The credit is 25% of the first $1,000 of expenses per child (so the maximum credit is $250 per child).
For more tax terms, visit the Glossary page on this website.
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