Keystone superintendent continues push for charter school funding changes
BALD EAGLE TOWNSHIP, PA – Keystone Central School District Superintendent Jacquelyn Martin reported on the continuing effort to get state charter school law changed.
She told the school board at their meeting Thursday night that she and several other mid-state public school administrators had a recent sit-down with state Sen. Cris Dush to continue their quest for charter funding reform. She commended Dush for the opportunity and said he asked the group to put their concerns in writing for possible legislation.
Dr. Martin called existing law outdated and public school administrators have been pushing, she said, for 15 to 20 years to “change something.” Keystone Central currently budgets $8 million dollars a year for charter school costs but one single change, she said, taking the amount of money out of the total calculation for determining the tuition rate would reduce the district expenses by $2 million annually, what the superintendent called “a huge benefit for our district and taxpayers.”
She took particular aim at cyber charter schools. She said their costs per student are less than $5,000 each but draw compensation well over that amount from the home school districts of participating students.
The school board heard a report from the district’s secondary school principals: Nick Verelli at Central Mountain High School, Mike Hall at Bucktail High School and Dave Peters at Central Mountain Middle School. They detailed new intervention and enrichment efforts at their schools, the effort now in use in the lower grades this school year. They talked of program efforts to develop relationships with students with discipline needs. Board member Jeff Johnston saluted their effort and said it was about respecting the viewpoint of others, something he said has been lacking in the past. He emphasized the need to “get that across, not to be disrespectful.” The superintendent and the three principals said it was a very small percentage of the student population in need of any such intervention.
