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Big changes in school funding formula
Governor Corzine wants the state to pay up to $500 million more in a new school funding formula that offers no hard evidence of any coming property tax relief, but a guaranteed challenge in court. The latest details of the state's new school funding formula, released late Friday afternoon by Department of Education Commissioner Lucille Davy, show the state intends to tie future state aid awards to a community's relative wealth and the particular needs of each student. At issue is how to pay for it. The current system relies on a combination of state tax dollars -- about $11 billion this year -- and local property taxes. For property owners, paying for their local schools makes up the largest single portion of New Jersey's highest-in-the-nation property tax bills and any extra help from the state is meaningful. The good news, Davy said, is that no districts will see their state aid cut once the new formula is implemented. "Everybody will be held harmless," she said. "No one is going to get less than they got last year."
There are, however, no specifics as to whether the new formula will result in any significant influxes of funding to the suburban districts that make up much of the landscape in North Jersey. The new formula may raise state spending on education by as much as $500 million, with the money being used to try to better address the needs of individual students, especially those who come from low-income families, are learning English or receive special education services. An expansion of state-funded preschool programs is also planned. A key to the new formula is the establishment of per-pupil "adequacy" spending benchmarks for school districts. For example, the preliminary adequacy amount for a high school student would be set at $11,118. Based on preliminary estimates, which are subject to last-minute changes by the state, many North Jersey school districts are already spending more per pupil than the adequacy amounts the state has determined for their district size. For example, Fair Lawn already spends $13,304 per pupil, well over the state's preliminary adequate amount for next year. Still, state officials are maintaining the formula will be a vehicle for property tax relief, something Governor Corzine said he is hoping it can accomplish. "I think, in some cases, it definitely will," Davy said. But state officials did not release a list of preliminary state aid figures Friday that would be able to show exactly how the new formula will affect individual school districts. Davy said it is far too early to guess which districts stand to gain state aid under the formula, which will also take into account enrollment changes and the wealth of a local community relative to the entire state. "We can't tell that yet because we don't have that finished," Davy said. One major change in the formula is the way the state will fund students who live in the poorest school districts. Right now, 31 districts -- dubbed "Abbotts" after a plaintiff in a state education lawsuit -- are designated as the neediest by the courts and by court order receive billions in extra state aid. The schools in those districts receive much of the state money spent on public education. Any change in the funding must be approved by the state Supreme Court. Under the new formula, other districts will be in line to receive more state aid of their own if they have higher concentrations of students with specific needs. The new formula provides extra funding over the established benchmarks for every student with a special need, even those who live in non-Abbott districts. "It's not the most equitable way of doing this," Davy said of the current policy. The new formula also aims to expand the state's preschool education program over the next several years in an effort to reach low-income children, regardless of where they live. That means full-day preschool should be coming to at least six districts in the area that have higher concentrations of low-income children but are currently offering either no preschool or only half-day preschool. They are: Lodi, Moonachie, Wallington, North Bergen, Haledon and Fairview. The details of the formula released Friday drew criticism from some advocates of Abbott districts. "The governor's 'money follows the child' proposal is a shell game," said Irene Sterling of the Paterson Education Fund. "It fails to account for the needs of children living in concentrated poverty." "We see the governor's proposal as a step in the wrong direction," said Junius Williams, director of the Abbott Leadership Institute. Davy promised more details to come in the next week to 10 days. Corzine said he wants the new formula passed during the current lame-duck legislative session, which runs through Jan. 8. E-mail: reitmeyer@northjersey.com, carroll@northjersey.com * * * Is school spending 'adequate'? An early look at whether North Jersey districts are spending more or less than the preliminary state estimate for "adequate" per-pupil spending next school year. Education officials say these numbers will be replaced in a week or so with official, up-to-date figures that will better reflect new funding based on individual students' needs. County/District 2006-07 Adequacy* Difference Bergen County Allendale $11,533 $9,978 $1,555 Alpine $21,534 $9,978 $11,556 Bergen County Voc. $18,873 $14,565 $4,308 Bergenfield $11,022 $11,118 -$96 Bogota $10,998 $11,118 -$120 Carlstadt $12,996 $9,978 $3,018 Carlstadt-East Rutherford Reg. $14,389 $11,118 $3,271 Cliffside Park $9,882 $11,118 -$1,236 Closter $11,122 $9,978 $1,144 Cresskill $11,024 $11,118 -$94 Demarest $12,504 $9,978 $2,526 Dumont $11,254 $11,118 $136 East Rutherford $11,756 $9,978 $1,778 Edgewater $13,687 $9,503 $4,184 Elmwood Park $9,345 $11,118 -$1,773 Emerson $11,250 $11,118 $132 Englewood $14,434 $11,118 $3,316 Englewood Cliffs $15,645 $9,978 $5,667 Fair Lawn $13,304 $11,118 $2,186 Fairview $9,714 $9,978 -$264 Fort Lee $11,643 $11,118 $525 Franklin Lakes $14,035 $9,978 $4,057 Garfield $11,317 $11,118 $199 Glen Rock $13,588 $11,118 $2,470 Hackensack $12,117 $11,118 $999 Harrington Park $10,288 $9,978 $310 Hasbrouck Heights $11,298 $11,118 $180 Haworth $11,793 $9,978 $1,815 Hillsdale $10,239 $9,978 $261 Ho-Ho-Kus $12,126 $9,978 $2,148 Leonia $12,016 $11,118 $898 Little Ferry $9,339 $9,978 -$639 Lodi $10,517 $11,118 -$601 Lyndhurst $10,837 $11,118 -$281 Mahwah $12,437 $11,118 $1,319 Maywood $11,958 $9,978 $1,980 Midland Park $12,413 $11,118 $1,295 Montvale $11,498 $9,978 $1,520 Moonachie $16,726 $9,978 $6,748 New Milford $10,987 $11,118 -$131 North Arlington $10,489 $11,118 -$629 Northern Highlands Reg. $14,356 $11,118 $3,238 Northern Valley Reg. $14,020 $11,118 $2,902 Northvale $10,738 $9,978 $760 Norwood $10,839 $9,978 $861 Oakland $11,749 $9,978 $1,771 Old Tappan $11,502 $9,978 $1,524 Oradell $10,651 $9,503 $1,148 Palisades Park $11,589 $11,118 $471 Paramus $12,907 $11,118 $1,789 Park Ridge $12,252 $11,118 $1,134 Pascack Valley Reg. $15,789 $11,118 $4,671 Ramapo-Indian Hills Reg. $15,408 $11,118 $4,290 Ramsey $12,232 $11,118 $1,114 Ridgefield $13,578 $11,118 $2,460 Ridgefield Park $11,632 $11,118 $514 Ridgewood $12,133 $11,118 $1,015 River Dell Reg. $13,069 $11,118 $1,951 River Edge $8,754 $9,503 -$749 River Vale $11,355 $9,978 $1,377 Rochelle Park $12,659 $9,978 $2,681 Rutherford $11,981 $11,118 $863 Saddle Brook $10,870 $11,118 -$248 Saddle River $18,110 $9,503 $8,607 South Hackensack $13,574 $9,978 $3,596 Teaneck $15,183 $11,118 $4,065 Tenafly $13,529 $11,118 $2,411 Upper Saddle River $12,314 $9,978 $2,336 Waldwick $12,124 $11,118 $1,006 Wallington $9,785 $11,118 -$1,333 Westwood Reg. $12,336 $11,118 $1,218 County/District 2006-07 Adequacy* Difference Woodcliff Lake $12,711 $9,978 $2,733 Wood-Ridge $10,473 $11,118 -$645 Wyckoff $10,952 $9,978 $974 Hudson County North Bergen $10,527 $11,118 -$591 Secaucus $12,868 $11,118 $1,750 Morris County Boonton $12,816 $11,118 $1,698 Butler $13,269 $11,118 $2,151 Kinnelon $11,316 $11,118 $198 Lincoln Park $11,745 $9,978 $1,767 Pequannock $11,411 $11,118 $293 Riverdale $13,312 $9,978 $3,334 Passaic County Bloomingdale $12,727 $9,978 $2,749 Clifton $10,215 $11,118 -$903 Haledon $9,789 $9,978 -$189 Hawthorne $11,240 $11,118 $122 Lakeland Reg. $14,193 $11,118 $3,075 Little Falls $11,391 $9,978 $1,413 Manchester Reg. $12,319 $11,118 $1,201 North Haledon $8,898 $9,978 -$1,080 Passaic $13,873 $11,118 $2,755 Passaic County Voc. $19,111 $14,565 $4,546 Passaic Valley Reg. $11,229 $11,118 $111 Paterson $14,995 $11,118 $3,877 Pompton Lakes $12,527 $11,118 $1,409 Prospect Park $8,850 $9,978 -$1,128 Ringwood $11,335 $9,978 $1,357 Totowa $11,196 $9,978 $1,218 Wanaque $11,414 $9,978 $1,436 Wayne $11,905 $11,118 $787 West Milford $11,395 $11,118 $277 West Paterson $11,073 $9,978 $1,095 *Prelimary figures provided by the state Department of Education; not adjusted to take into account the special needs of individual students who would be awarded greater funding from the state, such as students who qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches, have limited proficiency in English or receive special education services. Source: N.J. Department of Education |
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New Jersey officials outline new formula for school aid
By DIANE D'AMICO Education Writer, 609-272-7241
(Published: December 1, 2007)
TRENTON - All at-risk children will get access to full-day preschool and other services under a new funding formula outlined by state Department of Education officials Friday.
But while Education Com-missioner Lucille Davy describ-ed how the formula will work, it will be at least another week before school districts are told how much state aid they will get, and representatives of both wealthier suburban and poor urban districts are already worrying that it won't be enough.
Davy said the additional cost statewide is expected to be between $400 million and $500 million in 2008-2009. Last year, the state added about $200 million, or about 3 percent, in direct operating aid to districts. Governor Jon S. Corzine has promised that no district will lose aid next year as a result of the new formula, but there is concern that some suburban districts might not see any increase in aid.
A highlight of the plan is the requirement that full-day preschool for 3- and 4-year-olds be provided in all of the state's poorest school districts, not just the 31 Abbott districts. Abbott districts are the poorest districts in the state, covered by a New Jersey Supreme Court ruling that found that the education provided to urban school children was inadequate and unconstitutional.
The state formula calls for all districts ranked according to socioeconomic factors under the state's District Factor Groups scale as "A" or "B" to offer the full-day program districtwide. That requirement also applies to all "CD" districts with at least 40 percent of their children designated as "at-risk" - those in the free and reduced-cost meal program.
That would include some of the state's poorest districts, such as Woodbine, Commercial Township and Egg Harbor City, which already get state early-childhood aid for half-day preschool for four-year-olds.
The formula also requires that every other district offer preschool to at-risk children eligible for the free and reduced-cost meal program. Davy said they expect the first year to be a planning year, and that some districts may choose to partner with private providers rather than try to start their own full-day programs.
The formula will center on providing a base amount per student for elementary school, then adding funds for middle school, high school and vocational school, plus extra for at-risk students and limited-English students. But the method for determining that "base" has been controversial. A district's wealth will be a factor in the distribution of some special-education funds, an issue that is being criticized as harmful to suburban districts.
The impact on the Abbott districts is not yet known. Currently, Abbott-district funding is based on what the wealthiest districts spend. Davy said she believes the new formula will meet the Supreme Court's mandate that the state's poorest children get a thorough and efficient education. She said the state wants to move away from a two-tiered funding system while still making sure all poor children get the services they need.
The basic concept of the formula is that an "adequacy budget" would represent the amount needed to meet state standards. Districts would be expected to contribute a local "fair share" through property taxes. The adequacy budget minus the fair share would be the amount of "equalization" state aid districts would receive. At some point, districts spending above the "adequacy" level could see their aid capped.
School security aid also will be given to all districts on a per-student basis, with an additional amount for districts with large numbers of at-risk students.
The charter school aid formula will remain the same, a major disappointment for the schools that were hoping for an increase to 100 percent funding. The schools currently get 90 percent of the base per-student cost of the local public school district. Students who are attending an approved "choice" public school, rather than the school in the town in which they live, will be treated as residents of the choice district pending reauthorization of the School Choice Act.
State officials have been meeting with various stakeholder groups and the reaction so far has been mixed. The Garden State Coalition of Schools, which represents suburban districts, is very concerned about the wealth factor for special-education funding, which has been a major cause of property tax increases in those districts. And a coalition group called Our Children/Our Schools is worried that the adequacy formula won't be adequate and will instead cut resources to the state's neediest urban children.
The formula must be approved by the state Legislature, and Davy said she hopes to use it for the next school year's budgets.
New Jersey Education Association president Joyce Powell said she believes the formula is attempting to meet the needs of all of the state's students, but until the actual aid numbers are released, it is hard to judge.
"Conceptually, it seems to be headed in the right direction," she said. "But the details will matter."
To e-mail Diane D'Amico at The Press:
Corzine pitches proposal tying aid to student needs
Officials say line-by-line accounting of impact on districts to come in 10 days
Saturday, December 01, 2007
BY JOHN MOONEY AND DUNSTAN McNICHOL
Star-Ledger Staff
Gov. Jon Corzine yesterday started to raise the curtain on a long-awaited school funding plan that would steer tens of millions in additional aid to middle-class districts with surging low-income and immigrant populations.
The proposal would make fundamental changes in the way New Jersey pays for its public schools, including new guidelines on how much money is "adequate" to educate each child. It would mandate preschool in all districts with pockets of poverty, revise funding for special education and add new money for security measures in every school.
Corzine has pledged for the last year to move away from the cur rent two-tiered system that focuses additional aid on the poorest districts but has done little to help struggling suburban ones.
Yesterday afternoon, he met behind closed doors with about 60 leaders of the state's major education associations to lay out further details of his plan, which administration officials said would add about $450 million next year to the $8 billion the state now distributes to schools.
The presentation left out a critical piece: a line-by-line accounting of how the proposed formula would affect each district and its property taxes. Officials said that will come in a public presentation of the plan within 10 days.
"Show us the numbers is what I would say," said Tom Dunn, a former Elizabeth superintendent and now lobbyist with the New Jersey Association of School Administrators.
Leaving the two-hour meeting at the state Department of Education, Corzine conceded such figures will be critical to the upcoming debate. But he said the session was nevertheless productive in introducing the plan.
"I think there were a lot of good-willed people, and they listened graciously," he said.
The administration appears close to settling on specific dollar amounts for what it says is enough to educate each child, based on his or her individual needs -- numbers that will serve as the basis of the state's funding for each district.
Preliminary figures obtained by the Star-Ledger show, for example, a base estimate of $11,118 to adequately educate a high school stu dent, rising to $17,234 if he or she is poor and $18,623 if poor and with limited English skills. The current statewide average per-pupil spend ing, including all grades and all services, is about $16,000.
How those targets play out in individual districts -- and what each will be asked to raise from local taxpayers -- will frame much of the upcoming debate on the plan.
Corzine stressed in remarks yesterday before the meeting that no districts will see aid cut in the coming year. "This is not about hurting someone; it's not a zero-sum game," he said during a speech in New Brunswick.
Corzine has said he hopes to have a new funding system approved by the Legislature before its current session ends in early January.
The emerging formula is New Jersey's latest attempt to come up with a state aid plan that will satisfy the state Supreme Court, which has demanded a huge infu sion of state aid into 31 of the state's neediest communities on the grounds that previous state aid plans shortchanged students in impoverished communities.
Through a series of court orders in the Abbott vs. Burke school funding case, the court directed state officials to steer more than half the state's total school aid funds to the 31 communities included in the lawsuit, bankrolling unprecedented investments in preschool, construction and reading improvement programs.
As a benchmark, the court said school spending on each of the stu dents in the poor communities should equal the amount spent on students in the state's most af fluent towns.
Corzine said he plans to take the new formula back to the court for review once it is passed by the Legislature, and he told the lobby ists and local officials gathered for yesterday's briefing that he is confi dent it will pass muster.
But David Sciarra, the attorney who has handled the Abbott vs. Burke litigation, said Corzine's plan is fatally flawed, saying the preliminary cost-per-pupil figures do not meet the reality of what Abbott and other schools need.
"We still do not have an up-to- date, rigorous determination of costs for providing a high quality education in New Jersey," he said. "We have outdated, seriously flawed cost figures that are going to be used in this formula."
State Education Commissioner Lucille Davy contested that claim, saying the figures are the product of extensive review and study over the last year. And she stressed the plan is to provide hundreds of millions in additional aid in a state that already spends as much on schools as any in the nation.
"What we are talking about growing what is already at the top of the charts," she said in a conference call with reporters.
Davy stressed a centerpiece of the new formula will be additional funds for preschool beyond that now mandated in the Abbott districts.
Under the plan, two years of preschool will be required and paid for in all districts in the very lowest socio-econonmic categories, as well as others with at least 40 percent of their students deemed low-income. Funding will also be offered for preschool in wealthier communities with any low-income students.
The new programs will have to be phased in over several years, she said, but will provide young children a meaningful educational boost, no matter where they live.
"We believe that high-quality preschool is the best way to insure they enter kindergarten ready to succeed," she said. "And the best way to insure they will be successful in the years to follow."
John Mooney may be reached at jmooney@starledger.com or (973) 392-1548; Dunstan McNichol may be reached at dmcnichol@starled ger.com or (609) 989-0341.
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Gannett State Bureau/Courier Post/South Jersey
Preschool funds level disputed
By JONATHAN TAMARI
Gannett State Bureau
TRENTON
The state's new school funding plan includes a proposal for expanding preschool programs to a level that could eventually serve 65,000 children and cost $850 million a year, according to state documents that include preliminary estimates.
But an urban education advocate warned Friday that the new formula is being crafted to control other costs, not to meet the real expenses for teaching children. David Sciarra, executive director of the Newark-based Education Law Center, said the state is trying to limit the formula's price tag by low-balling what he believes is truly needed for each student.
"They're not designed to really reflect the cost of educating kids at a high level of success," said Sciarra, whose organization led the Abbott v. Burke lawsuits that have led to enhanced state aid for 31 poor, urban school districts. "If that were the case we'd have much higher costs and this formula would require more money."
Education Commissioner Lucille Davy rejected any assertion that the new aid figures would be too low.
"I'm not going to concede in any way that these are not going to be adequate resources and that anyone is going to have to cut programs," Davy said in a conference call with reporters.
Davy said New Jersey schools currently spend more per pupil than any other state. The state government delivers more aid per student than all but four states, she said.
The new formula calls for adding between $400 million and $500 million to the $8 billion in direct aid the state is sending this year to schools.
But Sciarra pointed to the level of spending the state may establish as its baseline for what an "adequate" education costs.
Preliminary school funding estimates show that the state would consider between $9,500 and $11,100 as "adequate" to educate a student with no special needs. That's less than the $14,100 per pupil average in the 2005 budget year, according to DOE. It would still be more, however, than the $8,701 average per pupil spending nationally that year.
Districts that are currently spending more than what the state deems adequate could see their aid increases capped in the new formula, Davy said.
With a lower base in the formula, the state would not have to send out as much aid to meet its own requirements.
The level of spending, and state aid, would increase for students with certain factors, such as low incomes, disabilities and limited English skills. For example, adequate spending for a low-income high school student would be $17,200, according to the early documents, and go up to $22,200 for a special education high school student.
Administration officials cautioned that the funding levels and estimates in the document obtained by Gannett could change.
Reach Jonathan Tamari at jtamari@gannett.com
Published: December 01. 2007 3:10AM
December 1, 2007
Poor Non-Urban Districts Await Corzine’s Revised School Aid Plan
By WINNIE HU
The century-old building that houses Columbus Elementary School in Carteret, N.J., has become so crowded that art and music classes must share the same space. There is no high-tech language lab, so a Spanish teacher carries materials from classroom to classroom on a rolling cart.
The students at the school, once predominantly working class and white, are now largely from immigrant families. More than two-thirds are poor enough to qualify for lunches that are free or reduced in price.
It is schools like Columbus that Gov. Jon S. Corzine’s administration has in mind in proposing a new school financing formula that would spend at least $400 million next year on disadvantaged children in mainly rural or suburban communities like Carteret. Because it is not one of New Jersey’s 31 Abbott districts, Carteret cannot benefit from the vast pool of state education money reserved for disadvantaged students under the current school financing system.
The new formula, expected to be officially unveiled next week, would replace a system that puts more than half of all state school aid to the Abbott districts, which enroll about one-fifth of the state’s students, and sends the rest to the state’s 584 other districts, based largely on need.
Governor Corzine has argued that the Abbott designation has become meaningless, because other districts serve students who are just as poor. Supporters of the Abbott system insist that it still plays a vital role.
In Carteret, across Arthur Kill from Staten Island, the board of education and town officials sued the state Education Department unsuccessfully at least three times since the mid-1990s to win an Abbott designation. Then they lobbied local legislators and the governor’s office to get more money for what they term “Abbott-like districts.”
“I feel that a town like Carteret is penalized because we don’t get the kind of funding in the Abbott districts, and yet the students who go to our schools are not any different,” said Brent MacConnell, principal of Columbus Elementary. “We’re one of those fringe towns that is so close and yet so far.”
The present system grew out of a 1981 lawsuit, Abbott v. Burke, which led to a court-ordered effort to narrow the achievement gap between rich and poor students, whites and minorities. In a series of decisions that set a precedent for school equality cases, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that the poorest urban districts should be given the resources to spend as much on their students as the wealthiest suburban districts.
John Myers, a consultant who specializes in school financing issues, said this week that the Abbott decision was one of the best attempts at the time to ensure that additional state education money reached poor communities. The plan focused on a small number of districts, though, and failed to provide adequately for poor students in the rest of the state, he said.
That problem has become increasingly obvious in recent years as demographic shifts have changed the state economic landscape. The differences between Abbott and non-Abbott districts have fostered resentments in towns that have repeatedly raised taxes and cut school budgets to offset their own dwindling share of state aid.
Critics have charged that some Abbott districts, like Camden, have wasted millions of dollars through fiscal mismanagement, while others, like Hoboken, continue to benefit, even though they are not so poor anymore.
In a news conference yesterday, the state education commissioner, Lucille E. Davey, pointed out that the original Abbott districts were identified by the Department of Community Affairs as distressed cities in the 1970s. She said the new formula would be applied equally to all districts, regardless of whether they have the Abbott designation. “They’re going to be looked at just like any other district,” she said.
Ms. Davey said that under the new formula, aid for preschool programs would be expanded to more non-Abbott districts. The state now pays for preschool for all 3- and 4-year-olds in Abbott districts, regardless of their family income. Under the new formula, a wealthier Abbott district would receive money only for 3- and 4-year-olds who were poor or disadvantaged.
Some Abbott district officials and advocates said yesterday that they would oppose any reductions in state aid to their districts. They said their districts still have large concentrations of poor students and a long history of socioeconomic inequality to overcome, even in places like Hoboken that have experienced an economic upturn.
Jack Raslowsky, the superintendent in Hoboken, said that more than three-quarters of the 2,600 students there were eligible for free or reduced-rate lunches. He said that he did not oppose the new formula, but that he believed Hoboken should continue to receive what it does now. “The governor should not assist other districts at the expense of Hoboken or any of the other Abbott districts,” he said.
In Carteret, where brown fields are all that remain of its once thriving copper and chemical factories, school officials have struggled for years to adequately serve the influx of Hispanic, Indian, Pakistani and Filipino families that have transformed the town. School enrollment has grown steadily to 4,100 from 2,770 in 1995. Meanwhile, school budgets have been tight; this year, the district is using money in its emergency fund to replace broken boilers in the high school.
Daniel J. Reiman, the Carteret mayor, said he has been frustrated when he compares his town’s crowded, aging schools with the shiny new buildings rising in the Abbott districts, many of them with hardwood floors and cathedral-style ceilings. “I can’t get money for school construction, yet certain Abbott districts are able to get funding for artificial football fields,” he said. “You realize something’s wrong with the system and it needs to be fixed.”
Sandra DeQuarto, who has three children in the Carteret schools, said the list of classroom supplies that parents have to buy grows longer every year and now includes everything from calculators to rulers and glue. “I’d love to see our schools get more money,” she said. “It would put us on the same playing field.”
