Funding Alert

The NJ Department of Education’s 2003 education cost study ignores or drastically minimizes constitutionally required supplemental programs for poor students. As a result, the amount of supplemental or "at-risk" funding proposed by NJDOE is clearly inadequate to enable New Jersey’s most needy students to achieve state academic standards.

In the study, released on December 11, NJDOE staff determined education costs based on hypothetical districts and school resource models of varying size. The NJDOE models included supplemental resources to help poor students and high-poverty schools meet state academic standards. The cost of these extra resources was defined as a percentage of the "base" or "foundational" education cost for all students, called an "at-risk weight." The DOE set the at-risk weight at 0.45 of the foundational education cost.

Research staff at Education Law Center (ELC) analyzed the supplemental resources added by NJDOE to its hypothetical resource models and compared it to the supplemental programs deemed essential by the NJ Supreme Court for poor students in the landmark Abbott v. Burke rulings.

ELC’s analysis shows that the NJDOE resource models either minimize, or ignore altogether, the Abbott supplemental programs. Many required supplemental staff are not provided for at all, including instructional facilitators in elementary schools; community services coordinators in middle and high schools; and dropout prevention specialists. Other required Abbott supplemental programs -- implementation of which is based on local "particularized" need – are also not provided for all, such as early grade math literacy and school-to-work and college transition programs, or only provided for in the very large district models, such as alternative middle and high school programs or on-site social services.

In addition, the Abbott supplemental staff that are provided in the DOE models – elementary parent liaisons and social workers, for example – are allowed only at the bare minimum level of 1 full-time employee, regardless of school size or local need. Other requirements, such as reading tutors in early grades, small per pupil allotments for after-school and summer school programs, are also set at predetermined levels by the NJDOE without any provision for the actual, documented needs of students and schools, as Abbott requires. Still other Abbott supplemental program areas, such as enriched nutrition and extra initiatives in art, music and special education, are simply ignored altogether.

One example of how NJDOE study ignores the Abbott supplemental requirements is especially glaring. In Abbott V, the Court specifically rejected the NJDOE proposal to base supplemental costs on a fixed number of security guards for each urban school, without regard to size, location, building issues, neighborhood violence and other factors. The Court noted that the needs for security in urban schools would vary considerably, depending on these factors, citing evidence that Trenton Central High School requires over 20 security personnel. Yet, the NJDOE 2003 cost study models provide for no security guards in elementary schools, regardless of size and need; 1 security guard for middle schools, regardless of size and need; 1 security guard for a high school in a moderate size district; and 7 and 8 security guards for high schools in large and very large districts. There is also nothing in the NJDOE report suggesting that Abbott districts will have the opportunity to demonstrate the need for additional security staff and programs based on local need, as Abbott requires.

"Its hard to believe that the NJDOE would repeat the very same failures that led the Supreme Court to declare the funding levels for supplemental programs in former Governor Whitman’s CEIFA funding law unconstitutional," said David Sciarra, ELC Executive Director. "This educational and constitutional flaw in the 2003 cost study is fundamental, and cannot be corrected by ‘tweaking’ the NJDOE’s hypothetical models. This is yet another reason why the Legislature must authorize a new, independent cost study, one that addresses the unique needs New Jersey’s poorest students and schools, and that takes into account the requirements established by the Court in the Abbott rulings."

On the heels of the sharp criticisms leveled at the report, Commissioner Lucille Davy announced on January 4th that she had hired three more experts to "review and comment" on the NJDOE cost study. They are Allan Odden of the University of Wisconsin; Larry Picus of the University of Southern California; and Joseph Olchefske of the California-based American Institute of Research. These experts were given three weeks, or until January 19th, to complete their reviews.

Following the Commissioner’s announcement, Professor Paul Tractenberg of Rutgers sent a letter to these experts providing background on the NJDOE study, offering his assistance in their review, and inviting them to New Jersey to meet with education and advocacy groups to discuss the state’s unique educational and legal requirements for equitable and adequate school funding.