President Barack Obama included millions of dollars in next year’s budget to ensure that more than 1,700 D.C. children currently attending private schools with the help of federally funded vouchers can remain until they graduate, The Examiner has learned.

Obama’s fiscal 2010 budget proposal contains $12.2 million to maintain private school vouchers for the 2010-2011 school year. The president believes the program should be funded until the children who are already enrolled finish school, sources said, but no new students will be allowed to participate.

Details of the budget are slated to be released Thursday.

House Democrats killed the program through budget language barring reauthorization of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program without approval from Congress and the  D.C. government  — both of which are controlled by Democrats. The Appropriations Committee urged D.C. schools chancellor Michelle Rhee to “promptly take steps to minimize potential disruption and ensure smooth transition” for voucher recipients who must re-enroll in a public school.