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school choice

    OP-ED

    Phasing Out School Choice Will Save Millions

    Nauset can learn from other highly rated regional schools

    By

    The Independent’s Feb. 4 article on the proposed Nauset Regional High School reconstruction [“Supt. Claims School Choice Doesn’t Raise Costs,” page A6] contains inaccurate statements by Supt. Thomas Conrad and fails to note the recent vote of the Brewster Finance Committee to “not recommend” the project. The committee found that the school choice program and tuition pupils from Truro and Provincetown added $4.7 million per year to Nauset’s costs. Nauset High accepted 219 choice program students in fiscal 2020 out of a total enrollment of 921.

    Supt. Conrad stated that the choice program is a financial benefit to the district. The facts do not support this claim. All of Nauset’s fixed and variable costs were considered in the Brewster Finance Committee study. Nauset’s total costs exceed $20,000 per pupil. Nauset is subsidizing these choice program students.

    Why is it that, on average, choice program pupils compose only 1.7 percent of the statewide school population, whereas at Nauset High School they compose 23 percent of the student body? If 5 or 10 choice students were filling a few vacant seats, the $6,000 payment the district receives for each of them might represent a break-even proposition. But 219 choice program pupils? This proposition defies logic.

    The regional school committee argues that there is no significant financial difference between building a new high school for 600 to 700 students and building one for 905. This is also false.

    Three other highly rated regional school districts — Concord-Carlisle, Dover-Sherborn, and Northborough-Southborough — prove that Nauset can save millions of dollars annually if we reduce our student population by 280. They accept no choice program students and have approximately the same number of pupils that Nauset would have if we phased out the choice program. Their average total annual expenditures are $6 million less than Nauset’s. These schools achieve these savings even though they pay their teachers an average of $10,896 more per year than Nauset. These financial data are from the Mass. Dept. of Elementary and Secondary Education website.

    We have a lot to learn from these schools, including the fact that they can offer a rich curriculum to their students and do not need to import additional pupils to achieve excellence.

    Bigger is not better. Bigger is just more expensive. Voting no on March 30 on the Nauset High School renovation is the only way we are going to be able to correctly size our high school.

    Bill Dugan of Wellfleet served as part-time treasurer of the Nauset Regional School District from 2005 to 2018.

    REGIONAL SCHOOLS

    Committee Ponders Future as Long Shutdown Looms

    Safety of students and community trump concerns about MCAS

    By

    BREWSTER — The Nauset Regional School Committee was considering the possibility of a district-wide shutdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic when it met on March 12. Since then, the schools have closed and will most likely not reopen until at least the end of spring vacation on April 27.

    At that meeting, committee members Ed Brookshire and Amy Handel asked Supt. Tom Conrad whether school days would need to be made up or if MCAS testing would be affected by a closure.

    Conrad did not speak to making up school days and said he’s not worried about the MCAS. Instead, he said he was focused on the safety of the students and community. “We have to do what we have to do,” he said. “We see it as a community issue, not just a school issue.”

    The committee also discussed how the pandemic might affect the high school renovation project. Bond adviser Lynn Foster-Welsh of UniBank Fiscal Advisory Services pointed out that the crisis has caused interest rates to drop. “Where the market may be when we’re ready to finance — I wish I could tell you,” she said.

    The committee is planning to decide how to finance the renovation project before district town meetings are held. The most likely choices are a 20-, 25-, or 30-year bond. Foster-Welsh said that after the committee decides, it has to notify each town’s select board within seven days. Each town then has 60 days from the date of the committee vote to hold a town meeting vote on the matter.

    Chair Chris Easley brought up the possibility of town meetings being postponed, which now seems inevitable. A delay in towns’ votes could further complicate things.

    Plans for making public forums on the renovation project “virtual” are underway. Two forums have been cancelled: one planned for March 25 in Wellfleet COA and another for March 31 in Eastham.

    Conrad presented numbers for the school choice program for next year and the committee approved the opening of 32 seats in grade 6 and 13 seats in grade 7, for a total of 45 seats in the middle school; also 30 seats in grade 9 and 14 seats in grade 10, for a total of 44 seats at the high school.

    The decision comes after some Brewster residents questioned the fairness of having nearly a quarter of the population of students at the high school come from choice towns that do not contribute directly toward the project.

    But Conrad said, “I feel comfortable with these numbers.” He added that the district expects more students from Grade 8 to attend the Cape Cod Regional Technical School in 2020-21 with its new building set to open.

    The committee also approved the FY21 operating budget of $24,690,214 — a $602,226 increase from last year. The total assessment to the towns would be $11,861,180 (48.04 percent) to Brewster, $4,818,616 (19.52 percent) to Orleans, $4,798,023 (19.43 percent to Eastham) and $3,212,395 (13 percent) to Wellfleet.

    RENOVATION

    State Agrees to $36 Million Share of NRHS Rebuild

    Project needs approval at all four town meetings and elections

    By

    EASTHAM — The Mass. School Building Authority (MSBA) approved funding for the renovation of Nauset Regional High School (NRHS) on Feb. 13 to the tune of $35.6 million — representing 27 percent of the total $131.8 million cost of the project.

    An additional $1 million in state funds is potentially available if the project gets final approval. Greg Levasseur, chair of the Nauset Building Committee, announced the MSBA decision at a meeting of the regional school committee that same day.

    Proposed NRHS site plan
    The site plan for the proposed renovation of Nauset Regional High School. (Courtesy Nauset Building Committee)

    The MSBA directors’ vote means the balance of about $95 million will fall to taxpayers in Wellfleet, Eastham, Orleans, and Brewster. Wellfleet’s share would be about $13 million; Eastham’s would be about $19.7 million.

    For the work to proceed, the project must be approved by eight votes in the four district towns: first at all four spring town meetings to allow the borrowing of the required funds, and then at each town election to approve Proposition 2½ debt exclusions.

    The regional school committee was scheduled to vote on the bonding method and term for the borrowing at its Feb. 13 meeting. But Chair Chris Easley of Wellfleet said the vote had been put off until at least March 23. He said the vote would take place before the first of the district town meetings, which is Wellfleet’s on April 27.

    The school committee members commended Levasseur and the building committee for their work.

    “You really have to be close to the action to understand how much work has gone into getting to an affirmative decision today,” Jim O’Leary said. “Whether this project goes forward or not is really up to the towns now.”

    School Choice Questioned

    Recent questions about the renovation have focused on school choice at the high school.

    There are 921 students currently enrolled at the school; 219, or 24 percent, are school-choice students from out-of-district towns, and 86 more are tuition-paying students from Truro and Provincetown. Thus, school-choice and other tuition-paying students make up about one-third of the school population.

    The MSBA projects a population of 905 students by the completion of the project in 2024.

    Nauset High courtyard
    Nauset High School’s courtyard. (Photo Ryan Fitzgerald)

    A group calling itself Concerned Voters of the NRHS Renovation has argued that it’s unfair for the district towns to fund the entire project with so many students coming from outside the district.

    David Danish represented the group at a Brewster Finance Committee meeting on Jan. 29 when a presentation on the project was made.

    “We have no problem funding a school for the students in the Nauset region but we do have a problem along with the other taxpayers in the four towns funding a school for the students who are coming to our school with no skin in the game,” Danish said at the meeting. “That is, one-third of the students who attend NRHS are not directly involved with the capital expenditure of approximately $132 million.”

    Each town’s share of the cost is based on enrollment numbers. As of January, 13.7 percent of all students living in the district are from Wellfleet; 20.7 percent from Eastham; 19.4 percent from Orleans; and 46.4 percent from Brewster. Levasseur said those numbers are constantly in flux.

    Erika Meads, a member of a parent group supporting the renovation, said school choice should not be a major factor in considering the project’s merits. She said if the plan is not approved now it will only cost the towns more in the future.

    “People have been working for four years to come up with the most cost-effective solution,” Meads said. “It’s not like people above us at the state are coming up with this plan — these are people who live in the communities.”

    The parent group, she added, is working to distribute factual information on the project to district voters.

    Levasseur said the building committee will be producing updated information in flyers and online at nausetbuildingproject.com. Forums are scheduled in the four towns, including one in Wellfleet on March 25 and one in Eastham on March 31.

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