Dear Editor:
I am writing in response to recent letters regarding “attacks” or “shutting down Hola”. No one is trying to “shut down Hola”! In fact, the Hoboken Public School District has lived together with the charter schools for over ten years. When Hola first opened in 2010, there was no objection. The 6th grade expanded with no “attacks”. In the past five years the HBOE had incurred such great savings and efficiencies to their budget to expand and increase many of their own remedial and enrichment programs, purchase all new textbooks, place Smartboards in every class and complete many facility projects all while the charter costs increased. Times have changed. State and Federal funding to the district has been reduced, the local tax levy is capped and costs have increased. Charter funding is always guaranteed as mandated by state formula, so any cuts to raise the annual, additional $1,000,000+ for the expansion will be felt by the students in the local public district.
Union City was mentioned as an example on how to allocate resources in a diverse environment; however, they are able to target 100 percent of their budget to the success of their diverse population while 30 percent of Hoboken’s local budget supports three other districts. This impacts staff and programming needed to address issues of poverty, special needs and additional enrichment programming.
I think we can all agree the state funding formula is not working for anyone and the current lottery/outreach systems do not produce the results we all want for our diverse community. Education is a very passionate issue! All parents love their child’s school and do not want to lose educational resources. No one “hates” anyone.
An “All Charter” district was a suggestion by some at Hola. This would mean closing all the public schools and converting them to individually run, independent charters. What are the pros & cons? What are the costs or savings? How to ensure all students are supported equally, especially those with Spec Needs and those impacted by poverty? What are the ramifications of no central administration and nine unelected School Boards?
Conversion to a Magnet school district? Unify the administrations and the individual charters convert to magnets schools while ensuring their individuality? Could administrative savings provide greater resources for all the schools? Could the elected board contain more “magnet” parents?
Maintain current configuration with expansion? Is it possible to find cuts acceptable to district parents to fund Hola’s expansion?
Or are there other options?
I believe now is the time for our community to come together to have this discussion. I would suggest an independent source to lead this passionate, communitywide discussion about public school financing, charter financing, outreach and enrollment and the future of Hoboken’s education.
Yours truly,
Irene Sobolov