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What does the $46 million charter school grant mean to NH? Hello, welcome, and a thread from a former education policy person. ::waves::
NH Dept of Ed wrote in its application that they want to double the number of charter schools within five years – that would mean a total of ~50 charter schools in NH.
Friendly reminder: in NH, charter schools are public schools. Also friendly reminder: It’s a *bit* more complicated than that beloved talking point.
Charter school advocates in NH will say they do not receive any property taxes. That is not exactly true. Special ed services in charter schools are billed to the student’s district, and the district has to pay that bill, no matter what. How? Mostly with property taxes.
Why does this matter? Charter schools have the legal flexibility to charge whatever they deem appropriate to districts (and, by extension, towns). That makes things a bit…complicated.
Hypothetical scenario: Let’s say a NH charter school offers small group services to 6 students, who come from 3 different towns.
The charter school could – legally, in NH – bill each town the full cost of the small group service, rather than divide by three. Interesting, right? And the district has to pay the bill.
The NH Dept of Ed has stated, in a variety of settings, that they have no detailed information on special education billing/service costs/contracts, as it is not required for them to collect.
You can also see a related convo during the School Funding Commission here:
Back to the federal grant – this type of grant is used to expand current charter schools, replicate high-quality charter schools (the fed definition of this is fascinating, but WAY in the weeds for this little twitter thread), and open new charter schools.
Other context that is important: during this pandemic, Commissioner Edelblut has – very openly – encouraged families to seek other educational options outside of their neighborhood school. And as you’re already aware, his children were all homeschooled & he was never an educator.
What this does to your neighborhood school: when students leave the district for homeschooling, for private schools, for public charter schools, your state funding is affected. That is, the money your town would receive from the state goes down.
And let’s be honest: the money your town gets from the state is not very much. See: Claremont I, Claremont II…(or this video, if you wish! )
The order of operations of state funding for education is super important: the first step is the state property tax, affectionately referred to as SWEPT. The state sets the SWEPT rate, and then it is raised through (drumroll) local (gasp!) property taxes.
THEN. If you haven’t raised enough in your property taxes to cover the “state funding” allocation, the state will send you “the rest” of its obligation. Huzzah. Except…
If your town is slated to receive LESS money because of an enrollment decrease – that is very very likely to result in the state’s share (from biz taxes, rooms & meals taxes, etc) going down. NOT your property taxes.
And, again, I’m JUST talking about the state funding - not the overall cost for a district. Remember: the state’s responsibility is *SO LOW*. 20%! And the state really comes in after your “first wave” of property taxes.
Now I know what you are thinking (probably). “But, Liz. If fewer students are in our district, doesn’t that mean costs will go down?” Let’s do a word problem. Let’s say that 24 students, spread equally across our Exeter elementary schools – six grades -- go somewhere else.
24 students divided by 6 grades = 4 per grade. That doesn’t suggest a cost savings when you think of class sizes, building needs, materials, and on and on. So – now you’ve lost some of your state funding, and maintained your costs…which means property taxes will go up. Yikes.
What does this have to do with the charter grant? In doubling the number of charter schools, students will transfer in from…well, somewhere. From neighborhood schools, from other charter schools, from homeschooling, from private schools.
When considering the education funding crisis in our state, it is odd that the plan from the Commissioner is ::checks notes:: to open a heck of a lot more schools.
That’s your federal charter school grant tutorial. If your property taxes go up (and they probably will!), make sure to thank the Commissioner for his hard work in securing this grant and advocating for it through 9 months of a pandemic.
P.S. OMG, I can't believe I wrote an entire ed funding-related twitter thread without using the words “Berlin,” “Adequacy,” or “Franklin.” Wait, I just did. Shoot. Thanks for reading, y'all.
