Charter Schools Taking Bigger Bite from District Funding

Hoboken school officials say they hope a new school choice program will boost public school enrollment and help them counter a growing challenge from charter schools that have now drawn off more than a fourth of the district's students.

Enrollment in the Hoboken public schools this year is about 2,000 students. But with the launch last year of HoLa, the new Spanish language immersion charter school, Hoboken's three charter schools have 546 students, Besides HoLa, the other charter schools are Elysian and Hoboken Charter School.

And that is starting to crimp the district's finances. Although charter schools are not run by the public school board—they have their own board of trustees—the funding is public. Roughly 95 percent of a charter school's expenses are covered by tax money, said Hoboken Superintendent Mark Toback in a recent interview. At a traditional public school, Toback said, that ratio is about 60 percent. Other sources of income for public schools are grants and subsidies.

That money for charter schools comes from the public school system budget. At a recent Board of Education meeting, School Business Administrator Robert Davis explained that since last year, the Hoboken traditional public schools have lost $1.24 million, which has been re-allocated to the charter schools. Charter schools in Hoboken saw a 55 percent increase in enrollment over the last year or 193 students, Davis said. The traditional public schools saw their student body decrease, with 194 fewer students.

The past year was the first that has been open, explaining the large increase in charter school enrollment. In the coming years, HoLa will be adding a grade per year until it reaches fifth grade. This means that every year, approximately 44 more students will be added to the school, causing more funding to shift away from the public schools.

WHAT ROLE FOR CHARTER SCHOOLS?

This report is part of a joint project between NJSpotlight.com (an issues-oriented news site that focuses on policy, politics, and community) and Patch.com to provide both a statewide and local look at the politics of charter schools in many NJ communities, and the tensions that sometimes arise regarding their funding in the age of budget cutbacks.

Statewide: Charter schools in suburbia under debate
East Brunswick: Questioning charter school's right to exist
Gloucester: A home-schooler takes on the school board
Livingston: How many Mandarin schools is too many?
Morristown, Morris Township & Morris Plains: Unity Charter may be a jewel, but it's one with costs 
Princeton: 
Red Bank: 
South Brunswick: A debate or a shouting match?
Teaneck: Innovation or duplication?

Public school officials complain that while the charter schools take away their money, they often don't lower their expenses proportionately. For example, if twenty 5th grade students leave the public system to attend a charter school, the school might need one less teacher, but it would not be able to reduce its budget for janitorial services or utility bills or boiler maintenance.  

Although Davis indicated that the lower public school funding won't require layoffs in Hoboken this year, due to a large number of retirements, it does mean that in the long run more funding moves out of the traditional public schools. In turn, the cost per pupil goes up.

Charter school advocates argue that their schools give students a choice and force public school districts to get better in order to compete for tax dollars. And Superintendent Toback agrees that the best response from the Hoboken public school system is to get better.

Toback said that public schools now have an additional incentive: the schools choice program that Gov. Chris Christie is expanding. The school choice model allows students from certain neighboring districts to attend Hoboken's schools. Those students would bring in funding.

Toback said that he wants to make sure the Hoboken school district is an "attractive choice."

LEARN MORE

To learn how charters in your area are performing—or all schools, for that matter—click on NJ Spotlight's report card.