Spencer official on Baker’s education budget: ‘Suburbs in rural areas can’t survive on 20 bucks a kid’
SPENCER - A legislative delegation met with selectmen Monday to discuss the rural-urban local aid disparity in the governor’s proposed education budget, as well as the impact that charter schools are having on the Spencer-East Brookfield School District.
State Sen. Anne M. Gobi, D-Spencer, state Rep. Peter J. Durant, R-Spencer, and state Rep. Donald R. Berthiaume Jr., R-Spencer, addressed the board.
Under the governor’s proposed budget for fiscal 2020, Ms. Gobi said, Worcester would get an additional 30 times more per student than Spencer, which is unfair.
“The city of Worcester, I’m sure, is doing cartwheels because under the governor’s formula they’re going to get $600 additional per student. Guess what Spencer-East Brookfield gets? Twenty dollars,” Ms. Gobi said. “Think about that for a minute. Think about that disparity ... It’s absolutely not fair at all. And that is true for all the towns that we represent. It’s $20 a kid, under his formula.”
Selectman Ralph E. Hicks agreed with Ms. Gobi’s assessment. “Twenty bucks a kid — it’s an insult,” he said.
“As a former superintendent, one who served in education 47 years, I’m sick of getting pushed around,” Mr. Hicks said. “I don’t mind the cities getting the money. I recognize their needs. They’re far greater than ours. But $20 a kid doesn’t even come close to covering it.”
Ms. Gobi said the Spencer-East Brookfield schools will always be at a disadvantage compared to more affluent school districts unless they can figure out a way to squeeze out more equity in the formula.
“There is no way our regional schools can compete in the same way as a Concord-Carlisle, not because our kids aren’t great, not because our teachers and our administrators aren’t great,” Ms. Gobi said. “It has nothing to do with that. But they have the money within those communities to make up for any losses or any lapses that the state isn’t providing.”
Ms. Gobi said she will attend the Joint Ways and Means Committee’s hearing on education and local aid Monday at Bristol Community College in Fall River. Secretary of Education James Peyser and the state Department of Elementary and Secretary Education Commissioner Jeffrey C. Riley are slated to outline their priorities for the state budget.
“I expect that there will be a lot of questions coming up to the commissioner and the secretary that day, specifically on what their thoughts are on the governor’s proposal and how it is not fair, not fair for so many school districts,” Ms. Gobi said. “I want to hear from them how they can sleep at night saying it’s OK to give one school district 600 bucks a kid and we get 20.”
In addition, Ms. Gobi said sending a child out of district through the school choice program can cost the sending town an estimated $5,000, while sending a child to a charter school can cost $12,000 to $13,000.
“It’s great if people want to send their kids to a charter school,” Ms. Gobi said. “However, they need to play by the same funding rules as everybody else has to play by.”
Mr. Hicks said Old Sturbridge Academy is siphoning off about 35 students from Spencer-East Brookfield, which translates to a “massive amount of money” being taken from the district.
“Just about every small town district, especially when you go west of Worcester or west of (Interstate) 495 even, is being hit by this,” Mr. Hicks said. “We can’t survive. The suburbs in rural areas can’t survive on 20 bucks a kid.”
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