Auditor General Jack Wagner held a press conference [June 20] to discuss the finding of a special report that found Pennsylvania could save $365 million by adopting separate charter and cyber charter school funding formulas.

“Pennsylvania taxpayers are paying too much, they are paying more than any taxpayer in the country in terms of educating a child at a charter and cyber charter school,” General Wagner stated. “They are not paying the true cost of what it costs to educate that child. Keep in mind we have 500 school districts in Pennsylvania, on top of that we have 165 charter and cyber charter schools. There is a set amount that it costs to educate a child at each of those 500 school districts across Pennsylvania, that’s 500 different numbers in terms of the approximate cost of educating a child. The amount of money that follows the student to the charter school or cyber charter school is based on the average cost of educating the child at the 500 school districts. If you have a cyber charter school that attracts students from 400 school districts, you have 400 different numbers in terms of the amount of money they are receiving to educate the child. Not the true cost of educating the child, the cost of educating the child at the sending school district. That is a flawed funding formula in Pennsylvania. That must be corrected. There is no common sense behind what the taxpayer is paying to educate the child.”

General Wagner explained that the department compared the cost of educating a student at a charter and cyber charter schools in Pennsylvania to other states. “Pennsylvania is the highest at a cost of $12,657,”? he stated. “We can save in excess of $300 million a year in annual sustainable savings, something’s that seldom talked about in government.”

Auditor General Wagner highlighted the following from the report:

• Pennsylvania spends about $3,000 more per student to educate a child in a brick-and-mortar charter school and about $3,500 more per student to educate a child in a cyber charter school compared to the national average, which adds up to $315 million in annual savings;
• Pennsylvania could save $50 million a year by eliminating a loophole which allows a “double dipping” of retirement benefit payments;
• The Department of Education should take a leadership role and set charter and cyber charter school funding rates like those in Arizona and Michigan.

“Even though these are public schools, there are management companies involved in many of these schools and there is a profit making venture associated with those management companies,”? General Wagner stated. “In addition, what we have found in some situation is the reserves that they have are somewhat higher. We also found out that many of the schools are advertising and competing with each so it is very difficult to track each dollar that is being spent but we do know what they are receiving and what they are spending. More importantly, we know what the national average is and in both of these situations Pennsylvania taxpayers are paying too much and local taxpayers are paying too much. At $6,500 versus what we’re spending at $10,145, the savings in Pennsylvania in cyber charter schools is $105 million.”

General Wagner urged the legislature and the administration to take action on the report. “The time is right for the General Assembly, the governor and the Secretary of Education to once and for all take a leadership position on behalf of the taxpayers of Pennsylvania,”? he stated. “There isn’t a more important time to do this than now. We need more revenue in state government for a whole variety of things. We have school districts cutting teachers, we have districts talking about the elimination of kindergarten, early childhood education and a number of classes. They simply don’t have the revenue to fund it. Here is a bundle of revenue, $365 million that can be saved.”

Source: myPLS The Eye Opener, June 21, 2012.