The absurd dishonesty in the charter school debate | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's Note: Once again, we understand and appreciate the Beaufort Observer for this insightful, no nonsense article considering the correct manner to educate our children, and those people who continue to stand in the way of meaning change to revamp a totally dysfunctional system here in North Carolina.

Why should not the money a child generates follow that child to whereever the services are provided to that child?

    The Washington Daily News has done it yet again. This time it was a hatchet job on SB 8 and charter schools via way of allowing School Board Chairman Robert Belcher to spew lies and distortions. So to offer some balance, here is The Truth.

    Mr. Belcher, as quoted in the WDN, complains that SB 8 should be defeated because charter schools take money away from public schools. That's not true and he knows it. In fact, the public schools (used here to refer to the 115 administrative units in N. C.) make money when a student goes to a charter school. If Mr. Belcher wants to debate the point, we will be happy to go head up with him (and offer him equal space here to argue his case) if he will tell us this: Why is the per pupil expenditure from state and local funds less at charter schools than it is in the public schools? And we are talking about those funds that the courts have designated as "current expense." Not the Current Expense Fund (2) but from current expense allotments that are supposed to, by law, be given to charter schools on a pro rata basis. The fact is, they leave money behind that the public schools benefit from. But really, that's not the point.

    Mr. Belcher's argument has been defeated every time the matter has been heard in court. He knows about the Sugar Creek case and he also knows that Beaufort County Schools has been just as guilty as was the case in Sugar Creek. Yet he stands up in a public meeting and claims that charter school students drain money from the public schools. But that distortion is minor (in terms of dollars) compared to another distortion Mr. Belcher continues to make, and that is that the School System needs more money and he whines about the "Funding Agreement" from Chickengate running out this year.

    To see the dishonesty in his position one need only recall that this School Board overspent the $33 million bond issue by $6.4 million and has exhausted all of the windfall the schools garnered from the Chickengate Agreement, much of it on Mr. Belcher's kingdom building at his favored schools, while other needs were put on the back burner. If that money had been saved there would be enough to avoid any cuts next year, regardless of SB 8 or the loss of Federal stimulus funds or state cuts.

    But back to the charter school issue.

    The point is that if students choose to go to a charter school the public schools don't have the expense of educating them. Why should not ALL per pupil allotments go where the child is being taught? It seems to us if you don't provide the service you don't need the money that has been allotted for that service. And again, Mr. Belcher understands this but he distorts the arguments. The proof is in the difference in the per pupil expenditures of the charter schools and the public schools. Why does not the WDN ask Mr. Belcher how much Beaufort County Schools spent per pupil from the Current Expense Fund and how much the Washington Charter School spent per pupil from their pro rata share of that fund?

    And lest we forget, Mr. Belcher continually flaunts his concern for the "children." So one has to wonder if he does not consider the charter school students as children worthy of getting a fair shake. The WDN should have asked him how he justifies arguing against sending ALL of the money a child generates to wherever that child gets the services from.

    Again, we'll offer ample space for Mr. Belcher to explain that.

    Moreover, Mr. Belcher distorts the truth even more when he complains that charter schools don't have to provide lunch or transportation. But what he knows and understands he does not tell the public, or the WDN and they don't check, is that the allotments for food service and transportation are above and beyond the allotments that must be divided pro rata with the charter schools.

    So here's the truth. The Food Service Fund is separate from the Current Expense Fund (which is required by law to be divided pro rata). The state gives the public school LEA's transportation funds above and beyond the Current Expense Fund. Those allotments get left with the public schools even though they don't have to feed the students or provide them transportation. If the school system chooses to spend more than the state allotment on transportation (such as busing students from one side of the Washington Attendance Area to the other, often past several closer schools) then why should they not pay for that decision? Why should the charter schools subsidize inefficient transportation? And Mr. Belcher also knows this, but is not honest enough to disclose it.

    The same is true with Food Service. Mr. Belcher knows this all too well (because they have discussed it) that the Food Service Fund is supposed to contribute "indirect costs" to the Current Expense Fund which is required by law to be distributed pro rata to the charter school. That has not been being done. So the Washington Charter School has been cheated out of their share of the indirect costs and Mr. Belcher knows this.

SB 8 proposes to take the administration of charter schools out from under the State Board of Education and opponents of SB8 complain about that. But all of this mess about pro rata funding is precisely the result of the State Board and its administrators discriminating against charter schools. They could have used separate budget codes to designate allotments that should be distributed on a pro rata basis and then the LEA's would have been able to do it right and do it quickly. But they have fought doing it right ever since the charter schools were created and that is why SB 8 says take the responsibility away from them. They have not done their job right and should not be allowed to harass charter schools.

    And finally, another point the WDN failed to disclose when it let Sen. Stan White go on and on about "re-segregation." The law requires charter schools, if they have more applications than slots to fill, to use a lottery to select students. That is obviously contradictory to Sen. White's idea that quotas be achieved in the student demographics.

    If there were any "re-segregation" it would be the direct result of parents' making a choice of whether to apply.

    Let us tell you what is really going on here. The public school system in this state has an elitist attitude wherein they believe they know better what is best for all children than do the parents. They think parents are too stupid to exercise their natural law right to decide what is best for their child. That is the real problem here. That is what drives the "dress code." But for the teachers union, the School Board Association, and Mr. Belcher--along with most of the Educational Establishment--it is fear. Our superintendent being an exception, they fear that if charter schools are allowed to flourish (i.e., not held back by the games being played) that parents will choose those schools because the public schools have not satisfied their customers, which are the parents. And that is the reason every legislator should vote for SB 8. And the next step should be to provide for choice within the public school system.

    We will predict that one of these days our progeny will look back on this period in American education and shake their heads in wonderment that We The People allowed school boards to decide which school a child attends. They will view it as ridiculous as if the government tried to tell us which grocery store we must buy from. And we wonder if Mr. Belcher will be there to argue that if we don't choose to trade with his grocery store that we still ought to pay part of his bill at the grocery store he chooses.

    And finally, we anticipate that this shot at charter schools is but a precursor of things to come in the weeks ahead as the state and county try to deal with the toughest economic crisis of our lifetimes (most of us anyway.)

    The state faces a $3 billion plus budget deficit. Since the largest chunk of the state's budget goes to public education it only makes sense that cuts will come. The county is also facing the worst financial crisis in years. Revenues are down, costs are up, and the county has spent its reserves, or fund balance. The county will either have to cut expenditures or raise taxes and raising taxes with unemployment at record levels now is not the time to raise taxes. And Mr. Belcher stood up at a recent public meeting and ask the schools' supporters to lobby for more money. We find that astounding arrogant.

    If the schools had been doing what they should have been doing they would have not overspent on the bond projects by over six million dollars and they would not have been building weight rooms and other projects that could have been postponed until we get through this crisis.

    So we think it is absurd for Mr. Belcher to be pushing for more money when he, more than any other individual (other than Jeff Moss) has spent us into a hole we will either have to cut deep or raise taxes. Neither is a good choice. The better choice was to have prepared for this recession by sound financial management and our school board and county have done just the opposite. And it is just not right for them to try to dump the blame on charter schools.