Friday, January 23, 2009
By Harold Gwin
Youngstown pupils are enrolled at 69 other schools.
YOUNGSTOWN — Children who have left the city school system for charter, open-enrollment and educational-choice-voucher schools are costing the district nearly $29 million in lost revenue this fiscal year.
William Johnson, district treasurer, presented the city school board’s finance committee with a report showing that 3,876 children who would normally be enrolled in the city schools have chosen to go elsewhere, taking state subsidy funds with them.
The district’s enrollment is 7,253.
The financial loss to the district has reached $28,856,969, according to Johnson’s report, which noted there are 69 other schools now enrolling Youngstown pupils.
The loss of pupils and revenue to charter, open-enrollment and voucher schools continues to grow.
The school district’s fiscal year runs from July 1 to June 30. The loss reported a year ago, in January 2008, was 3,562 pupils and $26.4 million.
School officials have said repeatedly that the loss has been a major factor in Youngstown’s attempt to emerge from state-declared fiscal emergency, a designation placed on the district in November 2006 when its general fund began running a deficit.
Youngstown has had to borrow some $25 million from the state over the last two years to balance its budgets and will likely have to borrow an additional $9 million this year.
The biggest loss of pupils is to charter schools. There are 30 of them with a total of 2,743 Youngstown children, according to Johnson’s report. The revenue loss is $22,899,854 this year, he said.
“We need to show these schools aren’t a panacea,” said board member Lock P. Beachum Sr., pointing out that the charter schools don’t score higher on the state report card than does the Youngstown district.
The district has created a committee to work on that, said Wendy Webb, superintendent. That strategy will include a mailing to parents of children who are in charter schools showing a comparison of district achievement test scores with those of the charter schools, she said.
Youngstown, as a district, was in academic watch in last year’s state local report card, with its individual schools ranging from effective to academic emergency.
Local charter schools operating in the city were all in academic watch or academic emergency, according to the state report card results reported in The Vindicator.
A total of 25 schools offering open enrollment took 773 children out of the city schools this year, resulting in a revenue loss of $4,113,763, Johnson’s report said.
“There are the kids we need to bring back,” Johnson said, explaining the district needs to highlight some of its recent academic achievements to entice parents to return their children to the city schools.
Webb said the new committee is considering a number of strategies to help make that happen and will be making recommendations to the board soon.
Johnson’s report showed there are 14 private schools in the area participating in the educational-choice-school voucher program offered by the state, which has the state picking up tuition costs for children who want to leave academically troubled public schools.
Those 14 schools have enrolled 360 city school kids, the report showed, resulting in a $1,843,352 loss to Youngstown.
gwin@vindy.com