Study: Charter schools get more money than school districts - News - providencejournal.com - Providence, RI

Study: Charter schools get more money than school districts - News - providencejournal.com - Providence, RI:

• Study: Charter schools get more money than school districts

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — A House study committee looking into the financial impact of charter schools says that charters get disproportionately more money under the current school funding formula than their sending school districts. 

The committee, which will soon issue a report, did not recommend how the state's Fair Funding Formula should be revised to reflect an equitable share of the costs born by the traditional district versus the charter schools.      

Districts for years have argued that the state’s fair funding formula, in which tuition dollars follow students as they leave traditional public schools for charters, actually draws more money away from districts because the districts assume greater costs in the area of special needs and transportation.

The study committee, chaired by Rep. Jeremiah O’Grady, D-Lincoln, looked at whether the costs of educating each student are greater for traditional districts than they are for charters. About 7,000 students are enrolled in 25 charter schools in Rhode Island and public demand continues to rise.

The Special Legislative Committee to Study and Assess Rhode Island’s Fair Funding Formula began taking testimony from school superintendents and charter proponents in the fall. But the committee didn’t want to rely only on subjective information.

The board asked the state Department of Education if it had any data to support superintendents’ claims that charters were costing districts money.

“The study found that the funding formula disproportionately funds charter schools at the expense of the sending school districts,” O’Grady said.

Michael Magee, chief executive officer of the Rhode Island Mayoral Academies, which includes mayoral-run charters in Providence and northern Rhode Island, could not be reached for comment Monday.

"It is time for Rhode Islanders to understand that this is not an argument of charters versus traditional public schools," Rose Mary Grant, head of Highlander Charter School, in Providence, wrote in an opinion piece in the March 29 Journal. "All of Rhode Island loses if we cut funding to the very schools that are nationally recognized as outperforming their counterparts across the country."  

O’Grady, citing RIDE data, said charters under-serve special-education students.

In 2014, the state’s public schools spent a total of $480 million on special education, an average of $3,653 per student.  

Charter schools spent a total of $7.8 million on special education, or $1,332 per student.

Special education made up 9.1 percent of charter schools’ total costs, according to RIDE, but it Study: Charter schools get more money than school districts - News - providencejournal.com - Providence, RI: