Bill Aims To Provide Scholarships To Children From Low-Income Families In Poor Districts

scholarshipSchool choice advocates, who believe the political winds are now in their favor, celebrated the reintroduction of a bill that aims to provide scholarships to children from low-income families in poor-performing school districts. Gov. Chris Christie, already battling with the state’s powerful teachers union over proposed budget cuts and pension and health benefits changes, had indicated support for an earlier version of the bill. The bill, introduced Monday by Democratic Sen. Raymond J. Lesniak and Republican Minority Leader Thomas Kean Jr., would offer tax credits to corporations that donated to designated scholarship funds.

Those funds would award scholarships to students whose families make 2.5 times the poverty rate, or less, and live in school districts that do not meet set standards. Most students who are given scholarships are expected to attend parochial or private schools.

A school would be deemed poor performing if 40 percent or more of the students did not pass the language or math subject areas of state assessments, like the ASK test, or if nearly two-thirds of the students failed either subject area.

“The educational bureaucracy can not bring itself to say the F-word — failing,” Lesniak said. “So let me say it. These schools are failing the students of our state.”

In a new element, the bill calls for state aid dollars to be taken away from the school district that loses students through the scholarship program. That money — the difference between the scholarship and the aid — would be used to fund an innovation program.

That program would award grants to poor-performing schools for programs designed to improve education.

The bill’s proponents released a list of 176 schools in 34 school districts that, given last year’s test scores, would be affected. That list includes 34 schools in Newark, 22 schools in Camden and 19 schools in Paterson.

The pilot program, if approved, is expected to cost the state $96 million in the first year of the five-year program, rising to $120 million in the fifth year. Lesniak said the state would save enough money on local education to make up for the costs.

The state’s largest teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, opposes the legislation.

The New Jersey Black Ministers’ Council, which traditionally aligns with Democrats, and the New Jersey Business and Industry Association, which typically sides with Republicans, both support the measure.

The Rev. Reginald T. Jackson, president of the New Jersey Black Ministers’ Council and a school board member in Orange, endorsed the bill and predicted it would pass.

“It has been extremely frustrating bringing about change in public school districts,” Jackson said. “We have made the schools more important than the students they are trying to educate.” APP

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