Charter school funding gap in FY27 budget

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city spends about $2,000 less per child in charters than in DCPS. For a school with 1,000 kids, that's $20 million less each year. You can hire a lot of teachers for $20 million.

Wow. After a long and sometimes informative discussion of this, you've come here to spew a basic talking point that has been thoroughly critiqued in this very thread.

Oh you mean all the lies spread by WTU? Stop.

Everyone can see it with their own eyes. Take Latin, 2nd Street. One of the crown jewels of the education system in DC. Though it's one of the very best schools in the city, and though it has a wait list that's a mile long, the building looks like it hasn't been touched since 1960 and the teachers are paid a fraction of what those in DCPS make. Why? Because it's a charter so the city starves it of money. Meanwhile, a mile away is Roosevelt High School, which the city has spend a quarter BILLION dollars renovating and it's still a dumpster fire that hardly anyone who is eligible wants to attend. But it's still lavishly funded because, unlike Latin, it's DCPS.

Funny you would say that about a school that just did a massive renovation for the Cooper building. Maybe that's where the money went.

Are actually this dumb? The Cooper building replaced a temporary space that was even worse than the building on 2nd Street. You think that if there's a high school that hasn't been touched in generations, and its middle school is even worse, the school only gets to renovate one of them?

I'm saying that Latin had some money and this is what they chose to do with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The city spends about $2,000 less per child in charters than in DCPS. For a school with 1,000 kids, that's $20 million less each year. You can hire a lot of teachers for $20 million.

Wow. After a long and sometimes informative discussion of this, you've come here to spew a basic talking point that has been thoroughly critiqued in this very thread.

Oh you mean all the lies spread by WTU? Stop.

Everyone can see it with their own eyes. Take Latin, 2nd Street. One of the crown jewels of the education system in DC. Though it's one of the very best schools in the city, and though it has a wait list that's a mile long, the building looks like it hasn't been touched since 1960 and the teachers are paid a fraction of what those in DCPS make. Why? Because it's a charter so the city starves it of money. Meanwhile, a mile away is Roosevelt High School, which the city has spend a quarter BILLION dollars renovating and it's still a dumpster fire that hardly anyone who is eligible wants to attend. But it's still lavishly funded because, unlike Latin, it's DCPS.

Funny you would say that about a school that just did a massive renovation for the Cooper building. Maybe that's where the money went.

Are actually this dumb? The Cooper building replaced a temporary space that was even worse than the building on 2nd Street. You think that if there's a high school that hasn't been touched in generations, and its middle school is even worse, the school only gets to renovate one of them?

I'm saying that Latin had some money and this is what they chose to do with it.

And confirming that you actually are that dumb. What's funny is half the city would kill to get into Latin, even if the facilities are terrible, and no one wants to the long term babysitting service you call a school, even if everything there is made of gold.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Okay, so DCPS modernizes according to the PACE prioritization, which is a law. It's not simply whatever DCPS decides. And the funding is appropriated. DCPS can't just decide to spend tons of money on renovations and say ha ha, we're sticking it to the charters. That's not how it works.

The PACE ranking takes into account enrollment, but also future enrollment projections, current facility condition, and attempts to spread funding around among wards and feeder patterns. As well as considering how much funding each school has received for construction recently. Frankly I think this is a much better process than a blunt, short-sighted current-year per pupil formula.

Exactly. DCPS has to take into consideration future enrollment and trends, and frankly it does so poorly. Taking the Coolidge example, the community argued at the time DCPS was being too conservative with estimates for both Coolidge and Wells and wouldn't you know it less than 10 years in and both schools are at or over capacity, with Coolidge being one of the fastest growing schools in the city and the feeder schools continuing to grow. The same thing is happening with the Whittier modernization.

Charters can leave their current address. They can find new space like nearby Mary McLeod Bethune did. Whittier cannot just find a new space or its over capacity school. And Whittier cannot cap its inbound students. Bethune can absolutely work within the confines of its space. This is just one comparison.

Comparing the building needs of the two different school types is asinine because they are so different.

And to the person who said charters are not businesses, they are. Like it or not they are businesses in education. BASIS is basically a franchisor for education. If you think that works and is good, fine, I'm not here to argue the value. But it has a just under $200M annual revenue with over $8M in net. That's a very different model than a public school system.

No, it doesn't. I think you know that. When you have to lie to make a point it kind of undermines your point, no? You've

BASIS DC had $16.2m in revenue in 24-25. They paid $1.3m to the for-profit (the one whose financials you are incorrectly and misleadingly citing) for curriculum, back office and HR support. That's probably less than DCPS schools pay to central on a per school basis. BASIS paid another @$6 million in staff costs (BASIS pays DCPS pay levels). BASIS operates with 100+ days of cash on hand. That's money in BASIS DC's accounts with permissible uses inly for BASIS DC.

The data you cited is garbage. Even if you wanted to cite to the for profit BASIS entity, you couldn't with any specificity because as a a privately held entity its financials aren't public.

What do people like you get out of making things up?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Okay, so DCPS modernizes according to the PACE prioritization, which is a law. It's not simply whatever DCPS decides. And the funding is appropriated. DCPS can't just decide to spend tons of money on renovations and say ha ha, we're sticking it to the charters. That's not how it works.

The PACE ranking takes into account enrollment, but also future enrollment projections, current facility condition, and attempts to spread funding around among wards and feeder patterns. As well as considering how much funding each school has received for construction recently. Frankly I think this is a much better process than a blunt, short-sighted current-year per pupil formula.

Exactly. DCPS has to take into consideration future enrollment and trends, and frankly it does so poorly. Taking the Coolidge example, the community argued at the time DCPS was being too conservative with estimates for both Coolidge and Wells and wouldn't you know it less than 10 years in and both schools are at or over capacity, with Coolidge being one of the fastest growing schools in the city and the feeder schools continuing to grow. The same thing is happening with the Whittier modernization.

Charters can leave their current address. They can find new space like nearby Mary McLeod Bethune did. Whittier cannot just find a new space or its over capacity school. And Whittier cannot cap its inbound students. Bethune can absolutely work within the confines of its space. This is just one comparison.

Comparing the building needs of the two different school types is asinine because they are so different.

And to the person who said charters are not businesses, they are. Like it or not they are businesses in education. BASIS is basically a franchisor for education. If you think that works and is good, fine, I'm not here to argue the value. But it has a just under $200M annual revenue with over $8M in net. That's a very different model than a public school system.

No, it doesn't. I think you know that. When you have to lie to make a point it kind of undermines your point, no? You've

BASIS DC had $16.2m in revenue in 24-25. They paid $1.3m to the for-profit (the one whose financials you are incorrectly and misleadingly citing) for curriculum, back office and HR support. That's probably less than DCPS schools pay to central on a per school basis. BASIS paid another @$6 million in staff costs (BASIS pays DCPS pay levels). BASIS operates with 100+ days of cash on hand. That's money in BASIS DC's accounts with permissible uses inly for BASIS DC.

The data you cited is garbage. Even if you wanted to cite to the for profit BASIS entity, you couldn't with any specificity because as a a privately held entity its financials aren't public.

What do people like you get out of making things up?

They're just trying to muddy the waters, and hide the fact that the DC government discriminates against kids in charter schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The truth is that charter schools keep a lot of parents in this city. Without them, we return to the DC of the 80s and 90s with people working in the city, but paying taxes in Virginia. That won’t ultimately help DCPS.

I’d love to see a strong DCPS. It’s headed that way. But this budget is shortsighted.

Yup (I went to DCPS in the 90’s)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCPS is stuck with its buildings for the long term and has to plan for long term needs and deal with long term maintenance and compliance in 100+ year old buildings. It was a huge struggle for our school just to get the bathrooms made non-awful. GDS takes forever to fix anything. Being part of a larger system has really significant down sides.

Have you been inside Yu Ying, or the new Latin Cooper building? They're as nice as any, certainly way nicer than our Ward 5 Title I.

And of course, why invest in charter buildings when everyone, including the PCSB, is saying the sector is going to contract?

Yes, those buildings are nice--and cost the schools specifcally money to build.

Have you been the Lafayette Elementary? Dorothy Heights? Both absolutely stunning.

Seen the giant project that Whittier is getting for their temporary campus during their remodel? Millions and millions of dollars so those kids don't have to ride a bus to a flex space.

DCPS schools are getting tons spent on their remodels.

Just looking at it from the sidewalk, it seems a little nuts this is the plan.

The parents in the neighborhood pushing it were so annoying. Some of them didn’t even have kids on the school yet. Would have been so much simpler to just bus the kids.

+1 I drive past the space they're building for Whittier almost daily. It's wild that the city agreed to wreck/occupy the public park space and spend all those millions to build a temporary swing space rather than bus the kids to a brick and mortar, perfectly fine building a couple miles away. I heard they're going to tear it right back down when Whittier is done with it too and that (unlike Burroughs) it won't be used for additional schools.

Agree it boils down to politics...the JLG/our Ward 4 Councilmember pushed hard for the temporary swing space and got lots of credit when it went Whittier's way.

Aha. I've been looking for more local detail on Janeese to decide my vote. And this is something I don't agree with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The truth is that charter schools keep a lot of parents in this city. Without them, we return to the DC of the 80s and 90s with people working in the city, but paying taxes in Virginia. That won’t ultimately help DCPS.

I’d love to see a strong DCPS. It’s headed that way. But this budget is shortsighted.

Yup (I went to DCPS in the 90’s)

Very true. My family stayed in the city because a charter school provided our children with an excellent education. We gave DCPS a try and are now moving states due to their incompetency. Two years of my kids' education was sub par, in exceptionally poorly maintained facilities (regardless of the money spent on renovation elsewhere, we all know that DCPS' administration and building maintenance skills are poor.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

If that thought experiment happened, DCPS could buy the DCI building and operate a school there. Or it could re-boundary Coolidge to direct some kids to other schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

The chance of most DCI parents sending their kids to Coolidge if DCPS "forced" them to is nil.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCPS is stuck with its buildings for the long term and has to plan for long term needs and deal with long term maintenance and compliance in 100+ year old buildings. It was a huge struggle for our school just to get the bathrooms made non-awful. GDS takes forever to fix anything. Being part of a larger system has really significant down sides.

Have you been inside Yu Ying, or the new Latin Cooper building? They're as nice as any, certainly way nicer than our Ward 5 Title I.

And of course, why invest in charter buildings when everyone, including the PCSB, is saying the sector is going to contract?

Yes, those buildings are nice--and cost the schools specifcally money to build.

Have you been the Lafayette Elementary? Dorothy Heights? Both absolutely stunning.

Seen the giant project that Whittier is getting for their temporary campus during their remodel? Millions and millions of dollars so those kids don't have to ride a bus to a flex space.

DCPS schools are getting tons spent on their remodels.

Just looking at it from the sidewalk, it seems a little nuts this is the plan.

The parents in the neighborhood pushing it were so annoying. Some of them didn’t even have kids on the school yet. Would have been so much simpler to just bus the kids.

+1 I drive past the space they're building for Whittier almost daily. It's wild that the city agreed to wreck/occupy the public park space and spend all those millions to build a temporary swing space rather than bus the kids to a brick and mortar, perfectly fine building a couple miles away. I heard they're going to tear it right back down when Whittier is done with it too and that (unlike Burroughs) it won't be used for additional schools.

Agree it boils down to politics...the JLG/our Ward 4 Councilmember pushed hard for the temporary swing space and got lots of credit when it went Whittier's way.

Aha. I've been looking for more local detail on Janeese to decide my vote. And this is something I don't agree with.

To be fair, Janese was just trying to solve a problem that was identified by her constituents. I find the solution ridiculous, but I wouldn’t blame Janese.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

DCI is approximately the same square footage as Anacostia High School, except DCI has 1,700 students and Anacostia has 250, and Anacostia High School is much, much nicer.

https://washingtonian.com/2014/02/03/anacostia-high-school-renovation-snags-design-award/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCPS is stuck with its buildings for the long term and has to plan for long term needs and deal with long term maintenance and compliance in 100+ year old buildings. It was a huge struggle for our school just to get the bathrooms made non-awful. GDS takes forever to fix anything. Being part of a larger system has really significant down sides.

Have you been inside Yu Ying, or the new Latin Cooper building? They're as nice as any, certainly way nicer than our Ward 5 Title I.

And of course, why invest in charter buildings when everyone, including the PCSB, is saying the sector is going to contract?

Yes, those buildings are nice--and cost the schools specifcally money to build.

Have you been the Lafayette Elementary? Dorothy Heights? Both absolutely stunning.

Seen the giant project that Whittier is getting for their temporary campus during their remodel? Millions and millions of dollars so those kids don't have to ride a bus to a flex space.

DCPS schools are getting tons spent on their remodels.

Just looking at it from the sidewalk, it seems a little nuts this is the plan.

The parents in the neighborhood pushing it were so annoying. Some of them didn’t even have kids on the school yet. Would have been so much simpler to just bus the kids.

+1 I drive past the space they're building for Whittier almost daily. It's wild that the city agreed to wreck/occupy the public park space and spend all those millions to build a temporary swing space rather than bus the kids to a brick and mortar, perfectly fine building a couple miles away. I heard they're going to tear it right back down when Whittier is done with it too and that (unlike Burroughs) it won't be used for additional schools.

Agree it boils down to politics...the JLG/our Ward 4 Councilmember pushed hard for the temporary swing space and got lots of credit when it went Whittier's way.

Aha. I've been looking for more local detail on Janeese to decide my vote. And this is something I don't agree with.

To be fair, Janese was just trying to solve a problem that was identified by her constituents. I find the solution ridiculous, but I wouldn’t blame Janese.

Agreed. Would be one thing if she made that decision as Mayor, but as the Ward 4 councilperson, she's supposed to fight for her Ward 4 constituents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

DCI is approximately the same square footage as Anacostia High School, except DCI has 1,700 students and Anacostia has 250, and Anacostia High School is much, much nicer.

https://washingtonian.com/2014/02/03/anacostia-high-school-renovation-snags-design-award/

Right, this is a good illustration. The Coolidge comparison was simply meant to illustrate the same point in a nearby location.

Charter schools should not be defunded and indeed should be helped to better facilities when they outperform and outenroll.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:An unpopular opinion for DCUM- if the charters were properly funded the better ones would blow DCPS out of the water. So many struggle under the costs of facilities and teacher turn over from low salaries. If Charters had money to solve those problems the middling to good ones could be amazing.

+1 on this.

Also, Coolidge has a lot larger and better facilities than DCI which holds around the same number of high schoolers. Sports facilities in particular. DCI could have used the space next to it for a much-needed sports field, but townhouses are going up instead. Now the school is battling neighbors to try to use a nearby park for athletics. The charter schools can't just easily move and buy new buildings left and right, and they aren't provided with enough funds to truly utilize public and DC-owned space like Walter Reed. Meanwhile, there is no way that DCPS could serve all the kids currently in charters - if all of DCI changed to Coolidge overnight, for example.

DCI is approximately the same square footage as Anacostia High School, except DCI has 1,700 students and Anacostia has 250, and Anacostia High School is much, much nicer.

https://washingtonian.com/2014/02/03/anacostia-high-school-renovation-snags-design-award/

Right, this is a good illustration. The Coolidge comparison was simply meant to illustrate the same point in a nearby location.

Charter schools should not be defunded and indeed should be helped to better facilities when they outperform and outenroll.

The city spent $130 million building a pool at Roosevelt High School, a school with one of the lowest take-up rates among in-boundary children in the city. The entire annual budget of DCI is about $45 million.