New Hampshire local school leaders have said they are worried a bill Republican lawmakers are fast-tracking to the governor could upend their school budgets and limit local control.
The so-called “open enrollment” bill would prohibit school districts from setting limits on the number of students they accept from other districts, possibly at a financial loss. The bill would also prevent school districts from stopping students in their district from enrolling in another district — and taking local tax dollars with them.
Students could still opt to leave the district to attend charter schools or use the state’s school voucher program to attend private schools.
“It is just a wrecking ball of chaos right now,” said Somersworth School District Superintendent John Shea. “There's no other way to look at it.”
The legislation, which was tacked onto an unrelated bill, has cleared the Senate. It could pass in the House and reach the governor within weeks – without a public hearing.
The move comes as districts are asking voters in upcoming school budget deliberative sessions to set enrollment limits, which is currently allowed under a loophole in the existing law. Many of those districts want to prevent any student from enrolling elsewhere, and limit incoming enrollment of non-resident students.
The bill, if signed into law, could come into effect before many communities have voted on budgets that have already accounted for limiting enrollment options.
Brookline voters will consider allowing just one student from outside the district. Milford will debate taking up to six, while voters in the Kearsarge Regional School District have already agreed to enroll up to 30 non-residents, but only in the high school.
Dozens of school leaders said their concerns are primarily financial, because of the way schools would be paid for non-resident students. The student’s home district would be required to send 80 percent of what they spend on a student to the new district — unless they agreed to send more.
That’s problematic, school leaders said, because communities spend vastly different amounts to educate their students.
For example, currently, Bedford spends about $20,000 a year for each student. If a student from nearby Auburn enrolled, Auburn would have to pay Bedford about $12,000 a year for that student, which 80 percent of what it spends on average per student. Manchester would pay about $14,000. Goffstown would pay less, about $13,600.
Bedford Superintendent Michael Fournier said he sees that as essentially a tuition break for students who leave their district to attend Bedford because they are getting a $20,000 education for less than what local taxpayers are spending.
Fournier said his district opposes the legislation for a number of reasons, including its financial implications of educating more students with less money.
“What does this do to class sizes?” he said. “Will my teachers be forced to have enormous class sizes because everyone wants to come to Bedford? It just creates real havoc on what's happening in schools.”
The bill says parents must pay any difference between the amount their district and the new district spends per student. But school leaders said it’s not clear if they can refuse to enroll a student if parents do not pay.
On Wednesday, the Epsom School Board will ask voters at their deliberative session to cap non-resident enrollment to a maximum of five students at its K-8 school. The board has also proposed prohibiting Epsom students from enrolling elsewhere.
Board member Carol Zink-Mailloux said the Republican-backed legislation would take away local choice. She said it would also create significant challenges if non-resident students opted to enroll after Epsom had adopted its budget or started the school year.
“It sounds like it will be, I don't want to say a free for all, but it might become that,” Zink-Mailloux said.
Shea, in Somersworth, said his district shares Zink-Mailloux fears and Fournier’s financial frustrations.
“It's very difficult for me to see this in any other light other than it is the state trying to take down universal public education as we know it and create chaos,” Shea said. Like Fournier in Bedford, Shea said forced open enrollment is also unfair to local taxpayers, who pay far more than the state for public education.
“This basically means your neighbors are going to be paying from their property taxes to send your kid to another school system,” he said.
Many school leaders said the bill has created a lot of uncertainty too.
School districts can refuse to enroll a non-resident student if they do not have space or the student has had a “documented history of significant disciplinary issues” or” chronic absenteeism.” The bill does not define those terms or say how schools measure its capacity for more students.
And, if the governor signs the bill, what happens in districts that have already adopted enrollment caps? The legislation’s prime sponsor, Sen. Tim Lang, of Sanbornton, could not be reached for comment.
“This does not create or strengthen public schools, in my opinion at all,” said Bedford’s Fournier. “It does provide more parent choice, and I'm not opposed to parent choice, but it just has not been well thought out.”
