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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAgenda - 05-06-1997 - 2 1 ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT Meeting Date: May 6, 1997 Action Agenda Item No. 2 SUBJECT: Charter Schools DEPARTMENT: County Manager PUBLIC HEARING: (Y/N) BUDGET AMENDMENT: (Y/1) ATTACHMENT(S): INFORMATION CONTACT: 2/25/97 CHCCS Letter John Link, x2300 4/7/97 FREE Letter TELEPHONE NUMBERS: Hillsborough 732-8181 Chapel Hill 968-4501 Durham 688-7331 Mebane 227-2031 PURPOSE: To discuss the possible impacts of charter schools on local school budgets. BACKGROUND: On February 25, 1997, Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools (CHCCS) Chair Mark Royster and Superintendent Neil Pedersen wrote to the Orange County legislative delegation, expressing concerns about possible negative impacts of charter schools on the funding available nest fiscal year to CHCCS. On April 7, 1997, Mr. Peter Morcombe, Director of Financial Reform for Excellence in Education(FREE), also wrote to the Orange County legislative delegation. Both letters are attached as background information. The boards may wish to discuss some of the points laid out in these two letters, and/or other aspects of the impact of charter schools in Orange County. RECOMMENDATION(S): As the Board decides. 2 CHAPEL HILL-CAFIRSORC CITY SCHOOLS Received Lincoln Un er. Rom Chapel HIM, North Carolina 27516 FEB 2 71997 Telephone: (919) 9,667-8211 FAX: 919-933-4660 Managers Office Neil M Pedersen Ann Hart, Assistant Superku9ndent Supwintendent for lnstrucdonsi Services Chester Preyar, :assistant Superintendent for Support Services February 25, 1997 The Honorable Joe Hackney The Honorable Howard Lee House of Representatives state Sec.-te North Carolina General Assembly North Camlina'General Assembly do Legislative Iirildnag clo Legisla#ive Offi=BuIlding Raleigh,North Carolina 27601-1096 Raleigh,North Carolina 27601 The Honorable Versa Insco The Honorable Eleanor Ord Senate House of Rqm=tatives North Carolina CCe�al Assembly North Camima General Assembly clo Legislative Budding. cto Legislative Building Raleigh,North Camlina27601 R`'le_'ogh North Carolina 27601-1096 Bear Representatives Hackney and Insco and senators Lee and Kiuuaird: Even though the Chapel Hjiii -,a ro,City SckQol Board recently gave tentative approval to the one charter school application that it received,the Board is very concerned about the eve fmaxial impact that charter schools wa71 have on students who attend the existing schools in the district. Under the legislation approved by the General A.-se ably last year,charter schools, basically,wiIl receive the saw and of per l fsndi�ng as the c0staict spends,on the average,for its other sue. this may q'1=to be etc le at firs&nc ,and possibly even fiscally neutral for a school district, the roliLY Is that sal dbbids with d2=ter schoob are going to saffer a.s%nMcrnt redwfien in dm finds available to operate their rig scihoolsi, This loss of svaltble revenue co-Wd lave_ a devast2fing impact on the servo-es provided to its across their districts. Allow me to provide you with an e=mpk frbm our distdct A charter elementary school was gives tentative approval by the SLte-Board eat this month. It is tea„ organized by pewle who expect the schod to be a=ac&e to ham schaolers and parents who send ter ch&Lren to trarlkonal pnvaft schools. For sintgtidty sake,let s Mica that the school acts a total of 100 saadeats: 50 stunts who am now erarolicd in our disiad; 25 who are home schooled,and 25 privately schooled chffdren. Let's also as==that 10 •- •,,1 • 11 f ii r♦ .1 - - 7.1 1 • a 7.1 . 1 :I .. • • ^f it u: t • n • i•e its fL • rr r r s f f 1•t 1 ••3/ I - a • t� t•.nt1 t. • •f- 1 :.1 • II+ •\tiq / t + t. ! - * i t r. • q 1 0. yt - :+tr+::fl Mt t+►. �. a1 .i• :'1 ♦'- �3Mt vLa t -f t+1 t • "t 1.•t :M •!. Y _ •:- tt+ 1•.. t 1 t r t 3A••• r1 'dl+K .r•t r fit ti ''ft r t.cwwt fN •i • H t f N. Z FMN • t a a .It+t •a tt oil ! i/ '�: ►1 Lp. .Mt i 3f•e 'M • ' 1# •rl H? r tia •••Ktf't C" ft tt ''R t, t•lf "'�fU7• tw�Y•-t•t;A =+ M..- • t• /•�. • e - r •t �!•r ■ a •11u • f• • st • to .la W..i ■ _ T •f - � - t w • t t1_+ ft s wtH _ •fir. �n i t+: It ' (ski•-.rs 1 f+aYU.f..+ .tf .a'rtf a its of ..ikvj ON ft_ fi H +.•3• )t t■">f ' If !*;- t tp•i :M7{1 fSia �. 111.! ' K - i fl i i t 14 H' Ua t Y- N\✓.it 1_ Waif f 1.7.ffilfwa= f fit s ..t 0 M a T fl 1j t + jet• i n • • t. • • 7-1 tt/ti • i'a i • 1 it tat ••/ ! !1 •ti / 13ni • .f.srytls /a• t t�- t'T ;ft I•i f4 i - Wit/ :11 .� I.a f + \ t < r .ri { ff f • 1 .••t s t a t•- :.•♦ s f - Za 1 f t r i a a. %.■. a �► 1 p�'1e tS f1 t �Ei�s r t r to f./ n.• : r. a.t.* a t a.• t ati cr •: t a ..:+ r a _1 �• f • .w.•fi •i 'F frf+ tG '•f+t.•+i wL .►t r "•, if r i'fM ••t F2e w. tit W. Its,* Its+ M:*1 • -H n Y=,41[ 6t ir.:+ .s t7feg t I.fftth:.•tL+Cr- !tf-f tt •'f c Wf7Bf1R•Yt/fF • t f t•tt s i t N h" tf ai 1 t, t,t t.7 F.t i 3}i t "!, ; F '.! atr� ' t t t f ^' 1 t r wit :a tt,i Y t �if 3. !3 'fit t \� • :ttf 'fx L ' � / f ye ►F 1t '� •'1 • 1• • -lr 1 t f •{:" ►r!•1 1 - •fr• U 7\tart. " h l + -+ Mt•a " AIR i• - U1 • 1 1 tr- "..• It til•a••+ �f f :ai '77x Y1TV1 t L• tf+- •±t rt.1 • rt .112"T, i9"(4r :Ii. t.•t t It-) lHtri` v1t•'t t. irl • 11 -�`I Rt ftf s t+�i tt • wW+• • i t.�••tit.�4t1Y. /vita".. • \ '+N■ • •of♦ir /•'• t ■ • r •►Itt ••■ '� t t tb •:.av • ti• •1 f•': ! • 1 f I f•♦ 1 ►•" • i tf- ! f.:i fill 1 ti U* +aa •t r ^ It+ f vM .t!1 Fw, •1 [t ' •.t.:I.•{ • if • 4a.L It T, / t 1t3. iR t a I•N is • t!C-1 >\ t' ` • /I tt t tt 1 Gt.f1 t� f Mt 7 t t9+tl • tt- aF i•f• •'ai as •• q 1 a • • •1 f • !! • :IS - v! • •tn t /3 r v 1 •H 'ra f/ :.• t't F f If a i • M� 1 t .rt l - 991 4 •1 t - • Y • /t •.:.:i a t 1 4 out of two months in the previous year or on a projection for next year that has already been made and sent to our district. These projections are based on historical trends and, therefore,have not been adjusted to reflect the impact of charter schools. Understandably, this impact would be difficult to project;however,the real impact of charter schools could be determined next September and adjustments could be made by the state. Our local funding also is based on the state's projections, and it would be best if County Commissioners were required to adjust their per-pupil appropriation based on this adjusted membership count. In the past,our County Commissioners have not gone back and adjusted school districts' appropriations when official membership was determined in September. For our district, which receives almost 50 percent of its funding from local sources, this is a real problem A third option would be to develop a more equitable formula for financing charter schools. It could be based upon the average amount that a school district allocates to its present elementary,middle, or high schools. To this amount,per-pupil allocations could be added for direct services that other schools receive that would not be used by a charter school(e.& maintenance and personnel services,and,possibly, transportation and accounting services). This would treat charter schools more like our present schools. If charter schools are placed at a disadvantage because of the need for start-up expenses,then the federal or state government should contribute such finding. By March,we will know what charter school applications have been approved by the State Board. This will allow us to deal with more definite figures. We are not sure how this problem can best be addressed,but we do know that something must be done if you do not expect to see the education of the other students in the Chapel Hill-Canbom City School District suffer. We would greatly appreciate it if you could advise us on what next steps should be taken by you or us. If it would be useful,we would be happy to coordinate a meeting of our local delegation. Please let us hear from you as soon as possible. Since 1 , M Royster, Board of Education V- A w Neil G. Pedersen Superintendent cc: Governor Hunt State Board of Education State Superintendent Director,Office of Charter Schools Orange County Commissioners, Orange County Manager c/ CHCCS Board of Education 5 Financial Refonn for Excellence in Education ReceivPm 200 Stags Trail APR - 1997 Chapel Hill, NC 27516-7310 Phone: 919-967-1029 April 7, 1997 Managers Office The Honorable Joe Hackney The Honorable Howard Lee House of Representatives State Senate North Carolina General Assembly North Carolina General Assembly c/o Legislative Building c/o Legislative Office Building Raleigh, North Carolina 27601 Raleigh, North Carolina 27601 The Honorable Verla Insco The Honorable Eleanor Kinnaird House of Representatives State Senate North Carolina General Assembly North Carolina General Assembly c/o Legislative Building c/o Legislative Building Raleigh, North Carolina 27601 Raleigh,North Carolina 27601 Dear Representatives Hackney and Insco and Senators Lee and Kinnaird, I have been informed that Mark Royster (Board of Education Chair) and Neil Pedersen (Superintendent) wrote to you suggesting that charter schools "could have a devastating impact" on the Chapel Dill Carrboro City Schools (CHCCS). They also claimed that for every hundred students enrolled in a charter school, they will lose almost$500,000. While I am confident that such wild statements and bogus figures will not deceive you, I am concerned that others who received copies of the letter dated February 25, may be misled. This letter is intended to give a more realistic assessment of the impact. The income of each school district is determined by the number of students enrolled (Average Daily Membership). The CHCCS district is experiencing a steady rise in its ADM and its elementary schools are operating beyond their capacity, in spite of the opening of McDougle elementary last fall: 9/95 9/96 9/97 Increase in ADM from previous year 251 274 300 Over capacity in elementary schools 405 83 225 The September 1995 and 1996 figures are based on CHCCS "Opening of School Reports" and the 1997 figures are my estimates (Pedersen estimates 270 extra students this September). FREE plans to open the Village Charter School in the fall of this year with 144 students in grades K through 5. Even if all our students are recruited from CHCCS, they would have the same number of elementary students in September 1997 as a year before. So they will lose no income at all. However, they will lose the dollars they had hoped to receive by adding to the over crowding in their schools. Charter schools are springing up all over the country. They have student waiting lists and dozens of teacher applicants for every vacancy. Almost all charter schools have opted for lower lobbyl.doc Page 1 of 3 6 student/teacher ratios than the LEA schools that compete with them. They are able to do this by increasing the number of teachers relative to non-instructional staff. It should be no surprise that most private schools operate in this way too. The group of parent activists that I belong to has already forced the CHCCS to direct a larger proportion of their manpower into the class room. During the 1995 school board election we attacked the CHCCS administration-for adding only two instructional staff out of a total head count increase of 17. They got the message and did a much better job in 1996. Once we have a few charter schools in operation, you can be sure that the number of non-instructional staff in the CHCCS will start to fall. The figures for September 1995 and 1996 are based on CHCCS "Opening of School Reports". The numbers for 1997 and 1998 reflect what could happen if charter schools are allowed to succeed in North Carolina: 9/95 9/96 9/97 9/98 Increase in students(ADM) from previous year 251 274 300 325 Additional instructional staff 2 91 100 110 Additional service and administration star 15 47 7 -30 I believe that the Village Charter School and future charter schools will force the CHCCS to add muscle and cut the fat. Successful charter schools set an example by putting children and teachers before administrators or service personnel. I can understand that this makes the education establishment feel threatened. Change is scary. What troubles me is that they should attempt to influence you with mis-information. I therefore respectfWly request that FREE be represented at any meetings you have with the CHCCS administration when charter schools will be discussed. Looking beyond Chapel FEII, charter schools are transforming education elsewhere in the United States and in other countries. For example, since '1991, government schools in the United Kingdom have improved year on year. A comparable improvement in North Carolina would raise us thirty places, to #17 out of 50 states in SAT scores. Charter schools (known as "Grant Maintained Schools" in the UK) were the catalyst for this turnaround, even though they still account for less than 6% of students in the UK (700,000 students in 1996). This rather large scale experiment has shown that a modest investment in charter schools can have a huge effect on government schools as a whole. I expect that North Carolina's charter schools will be even more successful than the British ones because we are learning from their mistakes and because our schools will be smaller and more innovative. The British Education Reform Act of 1988 encouraged the conversion of existing public schools to independent status. Consequently, British charter schools have an average of over 600 students. North Carolina's HB 955 encourages the establishment of new schools with a likely average of under 200 students. This will help our charter schools to be true "Community Schools" with great potential benefits as the following quotations suggest: "The child is not educated to return home and be of use to the place and community; he or she is educated to leave home and earn money in a provisional future that has nothing to do with the place or community. The local schools no longer serve the local community, they serve the government's economy and the economy's government. Unlike the local community, the government and the economy cannot be served with affection, but only with professional zeal or professional boredom. Professionalism means more interest in salary and less interest in what lobbyl.doc page 2 of 3 1 7 used to be known as disciplines. And so we arrive at the idea, endlessly reiterated in the news media, that education can be improved by bigger salaries for teachers--which may be true, but not, as the proponents too often imply, by bigger salaries alone. There must also be a love of learning and of the cultural tradition and of excellence. And this love cannot exist, because it makes no sense, apart from the love of a place and community. Without this love, education is only the importation into a local community of centrally prescribed "career preparation" designed to facilitate the export of young careerists." Wendell Berry The Work of Local Culture "Where the control of education is taken out of the hands of the family and the community, and schooling gets further and further away from the people who have a direct stake in it, the quality suffers. It is that which accounts in the largest part, for the deplorable state of American education today." Kilpatrick Sale, Human Scale,page 127 On March 14, FREE was awarded charters to establish two new public schools. On April 2, we held our first public Board of Directors meeting in the Carrboro Town Hall. The main meeting room was packed and members of the public were standing in the corridors. Our board members were overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of the participants. When the meeting closed we were"pumped up"as if we had just been awarded Nobel prizes. The next day, reality hit us when we thought about the problems that we have to overcome in only five months. We need to find start up funds, buildings, staff and much, much more. What if we should fail? It takes full-time salaried professionals four years to create a new public school. We are part-time unpaid amateurs. With your support, our chances of success will be much improved. The education establishment is responsible for the poor state of K through 12 education in North Carolina. When their representatives come to call, I hope that you will not be swayed by their self serving pleas to weaken or delay much needed reforms. Sincer , Peter;vlorcombe Director CC: Governor Hunt Jay Robinson Grova L. Bridgers Moses Carey John Link Herald-Sun, News& Observer, WCHL, WPTF, WRAL, WUNC Douglas Haynes, Robert Luddy, William Mauldin, Stephen Zelnak D.L.Cuddy, Dianne Jackson, Vernon Robinson, Sarah Stewart Louise Cole, Rebecca Coyne, Roger Gerber lobbyl.doc Page 3 of 3