[H]ARTFORD — Independent school advocates say a recent State Board of Education decision limits school choice for some districts contemplating a merger. The board maintains that the determination made last month is merely a clarification of state statute.
The board concluded in September that state law will not allow a school district that operates a school to merge with a district that tuitions students out to private schools. This week the board clarified that this restriction is in place only for “accelerated” mergers.
At a meeting in Hartford on Tuesday, board members listened to Vermonters who say the board’s decision has sown confusion about what the state’s new education reform law means for private schools. Many Vermont towns have a long tradition of paying the tuition of students to attend independent schools.
Deborah Bucknam, an attorney from St. Johnsbury, which has a public-private high school, says the board’s directive violates a provision of Act 46.
“The clear mandate in Act 46 is that when they merge they can keep their governing structures,” Bucknam said. But the board is instead telling districts that mergers have to be “monolithic.”
“If the board encourages school districts that they must lose their choice – which is the practical effect here – if they merge with a district with an operating school, then you are destroying a 150-year history in Vermont,” Bucknam said.
Act 46, the education reform law that went into effect last summer, requires supervisory union districts to form 900 student units. Districts that merge by 2017 qualify for “accelerated merger” tax breaks that start with a one year, 10 cent drop in rates. After that deadline, districts can qualify for tax incentives that begin with a 8 cent reduction. Districts that want to merge must bring a plan to the SBE for approval. If the proposal gets the board’s blessing, districts can take the plan to voters.
Questions about school choice surfaced this summer when several districts asked the State Board of Education if they could offer school choice and operate schools in the same merged district. The board decided last month that the law would not allow school districts to do both during the accelerated merger phase of school board consolidation reforms.
Mill Moore, the executive director of the Vermont Independent Schools Association, also presented a legal opinion that differs with the State Board of Education’s interpretation of the law. Counterarguments, he said, are “raising some very substantial doubt over this board’s interpretation of Section 4 concerning mixed choice and operating district mergers.”
The independent schools would like the SBE to revise their decision and “adopt a neutral position” on mixed mergers. But the fundamental problem, according to Moore, is simply that people are confused.
Michael Heaney, a Hartland resident and Sharon Academy trustee, said the ongoing mystery around school choice under Act 46 is having a negative impact on decision-making at the local level.
“Our school board is confused,” Heaney said. “Our residents are very confused. People are worried they will lose school choice.”
He said he was even more bewildered after hearing “all the legal hair splitting” at the SBE meeting Tuesday.
Stephan Morse, chair of the State Board of Education, said the intent was to clarify the law, not to change it.
“We are not making a public policy decision,” Morse said. “We were asked to look at the new statute alongside existing statutes and to clarify what it said. The lack of clarity since then is that there are people who disagree with us and that conversation has led to that confusion.”
After the decision was made, news reports and an editorial highlighted concerns that merger options are limited. Others speculated on social media that the clarification was a way to eliminate school choice through a back door.
The cacophony compelled Education Secretary Rebecca Holcombe to write a memo to the state’s superintendents to counteract “misperceptions” and “erroneous reporting” in the media.
“There appears to be some level of misperception that the State Board … made a ruling to change or limit school choice options,” Holcombe wrote. “This is not true. The State Board simply reaffirmed the fact that Act 46 of 2015 did not modify, amend, or repeal existing laws regarding the operation of schools, or payment of tuition, by a school district.”
At Tuesday’s meeting, the media was again blamed for helping to foster the imbroglio around the state board’s decision.
Nicole Mace, executive director of the Vermont School Boards Association, said that “consistent messaging” is critical.
The board discussed appointing a spokesperson to handle the media, but the idea was tabled after it became a bone of contention.
Morse said a point person for media inquiries would help the board control the message. “If you say something to the Burlington Free Press different than what I say to the Reformer, it leads to confusion,” he explained.
Peter Peltz chafed at this idea and told Morse that he was responsible for some of the confusion. Peltz referred to interviews Morse gave after the September decision in which he told news outlets, including Vermont Public Radio: “you either have to continue to run and operate a school, or offer choice. You cannot do both under the current statute.”
But Peltz said that is only true during the accelerated merger phase. Under the preferred merger model, choice districts will be allowed to merge with operational schools. This nuance has not been widely reported.
