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9-20-07 New Jersey School Boards Assoc. Releases its Report on Special Education
School boards urge a revamp of special education aid Friday, September 21, 2007 BY DUNSTAN McNICHOL Star-Ledger Staff New Jersey school districts need another $1.9 billion in state aid and more state-funded teacher training to keep up with the grow ing cost of special educational services for students with autism or other learning disabilities, a report released yesterday said. The report by the New Jersey School Boards Association said the state's public schools spend $3.3 billion a year on special education. Because state aid has been frozen for years, about $1.9 billion of that cost is picked up by local property taxpayers, a situation that the report's authors say must change. The report was prepared in anticipation of the upcoming effort to rewrite the formula by which state officials distribute more than $7 billion in state school aid each year. "Our schools need significantly higher levels of state and federal funding so they can provide quality services without overburdening local property taxpayers," said Ed wina Lee, executive director of the NJSBA. The report says the state even tually should cover the full $1.9 billion cost now borne locally. As a start, it suggests boosting state special education aid by $171 million next year, to fully fund a 2002 law designed to have the state cover any student's costs that exceed $40,000 per year. The School Boards Association spent a year preparing its analysis of special education costs. The ex penses, while only a fraction of the nearly $20 billion spent on New Jersey public schools each year, are a pressing concern in New Jersey's smaller and wealthier school districts, where special education costs can take a big chunk out of their budgets. According to the report, services 205,897 special education stu dents averaged $16,081 per pupil -- about 1.6 times the amount spent on general education. According to the Schools Boards Association report, New Jersey's long-standing penchant for placing special education students in out-of-district schools drives costs up through high transportation and tuition costs. "Students in out-of-district placements account for 10 percent of the special education population, but use almost 40 percent of the expenditures," Lee said during a press conference at the Statehouse to present the report. One reason is that tuition at the private schools, where 12,800 of the students are served, averages $44,000 per year. The report, which analyzed school spending in 2005 and 2006, also noted that staffing for special education services has increased sharply, with school districts hav ing one staff member for every five special-needs students in 2005, compared to one for every seven students a decade earlier. Besides calling for higher levels of state aid, the report recommended bringing more of the special education students back to their home districts, a move that the authors suggested could cut the out-of-district cost by 30 percent. The report also said special needs aid should be distributed without regard to a community's wealth. Last year, in preliminary discussions about a new school funding formula, state officials had suggested special education aid might be folded in with other school aid, which is distributed according to a formula that takes into account a local community's wealth.
School boards urge a revamp of special education aid Friday, September 21, 2007 BY DUNSTAN McNICHOL Star-Ledger Staff New Jersey school districts need another $1.9 billion in state aid and more state-funded teacher training to keep up with the grow ing cost of special educational services for students with autism or other learning disabilities, a report released yesterday said. The report by the New Jersey School Boards Association said the state's public schools spend $3.3 billion a year on special education. Because state aid has been frozen for years, about $1.9 billion of that cost is picked up by local property taxpayers, a situation that the report's authors say must change. The report was prepared in anticipation of the upcoming effort to rewrite the formula by which state officials distribute more than $7 billion in state school aid each year. "Our schools need significantly higher levels of state and federal funding so they can provide quality services without overburdening local property taxpayers," said Ed wina Lee, executive director of the NJSBA. The report says the state even tually should cover the full $1.9 billion cost now borne locally. As a start, it suggests boosting state special education aid by $171 million next year, to fully fund a 2002 law designed to have the state cover any student's costs that exceed $40,000 per year. The School Boards Association spent a year preparing its analysis of special education costs. The ex penses, while only a fraction of the nearly $20 billion spent on New Jersey public schools each year, are a pressing concern in New Jersey's smaller and wealthier school districts, where special education costs can take a big chunk out of their budgets. According to the report, services 205,897 special education stu dents averaged $16,081 per pupil -- about 1.6 times the amount spent on general education. According to the Schools Boards Association report, New Jersey's long-standing penchant for placing special education students in out-of-district schools drives costs up through high transportation and tuition costs. "Students in out-of-district placements account for 10 percent of the special education population, but use almost 40 percent of the expenditures," Lee said during a press conference at the Statehouse to present the report. One reason is that tuition at the private schools, where 12,800 of the students are served, averages $44,000 per year. The report, which analyzed school spending in 2005 and 2006, also noted that staffing for special education services has increased sharply, with school districts hav ing one staff member for every five special-needs students in 2005, compared to one for every seven students a decade earlier. Besides calling for higher levels of state aid, the report recommended bringing more of the special education students back to their home districts, a move that the authors suggested could cut the out-of-district cost by 30 percent. The report also said special needs aid should be distributed without regard to a community's wealth. Last year, in preliminary discussions about a new school funding formula, state officials had suggested special education aid might be folded in with other school aid, which is distributed according to a formula that takes into account a local community's wealth.
