By Fena Patel
If only money grew on trees for the Boston Public Schools. With less funds, BPS isn’t able to provide students with all the resources they need, including AP classes, arts, music, and technology. This not only affects students’ learning, but also the quality of public education. This leads to students leaving BPS because they aren’t satisfied with what BPS has to offer. As they leave BPS, the money also leaves BPS and goes with the students. Losing more students in BPS means losing more money. And the cycle continues. In order to solve this problem, we need to redesign BPS in a way that attracts more students.
BPS budget is based on a weighted student formula (WSF); the money follows the student. In other words, students equal money in BPS.[1] Due to budget cuts and inadequate funds, teachers and resources are decreasing and class sizes are increasing. Students aren’t getting the attention and the quality education they deserve, thus decreasing the quality of public education. This causes students to either leave BPS to go to charter or private schools or just not come to school.
In an interview, Richard Stutman, the president of the Boston Teachers Union said, “We lost a lot of students to charter, also lost about $21 million to charter reimbursement, so that’s $21 million less for our public schools”[2]. In order to increase our budget, BPS needs to attract more students. I think that the best way to get students to come to BPS is by giving them what they want.
Students are looking for a place where they can learn beyond the classroom. They are interested in project-based learning, internships, multilingual classes, STEM programs, and arts programs, including performing and instrumental. Students want to graduate from high school knowing STEM skills, speaking Spanish or French, being able to play in a wind ensemble, and having good experiences with the outer world through internships. All this would help students prepare for college and face the real world. And this is what BPS needs to offer! We need to make our public schools like private schools, offering more choices and chances for outside classroom experiences.
“If BPS is getting money based on weighted student formula (WSF), then the money BPS receives should be enough to educate the students”, you say. Yes, BPS does get money per student. But, that’s not enough considering the money needed for hiring more qualified teachers, and providing sports, AP classes, and internships. The money under WSF doesn’t help in providing students a quality education. Since charter and private schools get more funding, those students get more opportunities to increase their learning.
There still could be more money! What if a new revenue stream could be created to fund the BPS? Using the Community Preservation Act (CPA) as a model, the City of Boston could raise money for public education. The CPA raises money by imposing a surcharge of about three percent or less of a tax levy against real property.[3] The City of Boston could do the same for all properties in Boston; exemptions could be built into the system for low-income families. Since the CPA began, “close to $1.4 billion has been raised to date for community preservation funding statewide.”[4] If the City of Boston creates a revenue stream like this one, it could raise enough money to provide quality public education. This would be a steady funding source for public education in Boston.
Of course there is never enough money to give everyone what they want. But there should be enough money to give everyone what they need. In this case, every BPS student needs the best quality education. For that, we need sufficient money. Enacting a plan like CPA would assure that. But BPS doesn’t only need money, it also needs more innovation. There isn’t enough innovation in the BPS to attract students. In order to attract more students and more money, BPS has to be redesigned, offering not only what the students need, but also what they want.
Here is more from my interview with Richard Stutman, President of Boston Teachers Union.
Fena: Right now the problem that BPS is facing is budget cuts, so why is it?
Richard: The budget cuts are one problem, but probably the major problem, and I wouldn’t say it’s a sudden problem, is that enrollment has stayed the same but we’ve lost a lot of children to charter schools, and when you lose a kid to charter school, the money follows the child to the charter school. So the city has lost now 121 million dollars that has gone to charter schools reimbursements so that’s 121 million dollars less that we have to support our public schools
Fena: Will the budget cuts affect that student- weighted funding formula?
Richard: Yes it will – they’ve made adjustments. All the high schools suffered a particular formula cut and that has severely hurt the high schools. Most high schools are losing something on the order of 2, 3 or 4 teachers. It’s forcing everyone to be extremely creative to solve the budget problem but the problem is when you became creative is that you cut things that you really do need. You may be able to get rid of a replacement for a xerox machine but that means the current machine is going to break even sooner so you save money sometimes in the short run, but you can’t keep deferring maintenance. That’s just one example. Most schools are very unhappy. There are 50 schools in Boston that are going to be cut pretty drastically. This is not unusual, it’s just an accumulation of problems.
Fena: How will the budget cuts affect the BPS community as a whole?
Richard: A lot of people will have to move to other schools. A lot of students will not have the classes they were counting on, like Biology II or Art III or Spanish. There will be a cut in certain subjects. Class size will increase a little, which is not a good thing and there will be a lot of things that people have been trying to make work that will have to be cut prematurely before they’ve had a chance to come to fruition. Every school has projects they’ve been working on: one school may be putting in a planetarium or bringing in a science teacher, another school might be trying to restore a library or they might need an upgrade in their technology. What it’s going to mean is deferring on all this stuff.
- “How School Budgets Are Calculated,” Boston Public Schools, accessed December 15, 2015, http://www.bostonpublicschools.org/Page/1107. ↑
- Richard Stutman, in discussion with author,January 20, 2016. ↑
- ” CPA: An Overview,” Community Preservation Coalition, accessed February 22, 2016, http://www.communitypreservation.org/content/cpa-overview. ↑
- “CPA: An Overview,” accessed February 22, 2016. ↑
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