Plan would cut funds to charter schools

DENVER - Colorado charter schools' state funding would be cut by $4.5 million next year under a new School Finance Act provision that changes how atrisk students are funded.

Seventeen charter schools in El Paso County would get about $815,000 less for the 2008-09 school year. Of that, about $468,000 would be taken from James Irwin Charter School.

Nine charter schools in the county would get more money - about $533,000 - under an amendment added late Thursday.

Backers of charter schools charged the funding change is another attack on the publicly funded, but community-run schools.

"There's a lot of hostility toward charter schools in the state of Colorado," said Keith King, a former House minority leader who is administrator of Colorado Springs Early Colleges charter school.

School districts receive extra state funding depending on the number of "atrisk" children who qualify for free lunch at the schools. The proposed change would award that funding based on the number of low-income students attending each charter school, rather than on the average for the district.

Because most charter schools have a lower percentage of at-risk kids than other public K-12 schools - a fact that has gnawed at legislative supporters of traditional public schools - 106 charter schools in the state would lose money, while 35 would gain more. The losses projected by the Colorado Department of Education range from less than $200 to nearly $500,000 at James Irwin, which serves a low percentage of at-risk students in Harrison District 2.

House Education Committee Chairman Mike Merrifield, D-Colorado Springs, said he thinks the change is a fairer way of funding these schools. Although he is not sure whether the provision will stay in the bill as it makes its way through the Legislature - Senate President Peter Groff, D-Denver, is a charter school supporter - he says he hopes it generates discussion.

"It will be an honest accounting of what at-risk means and charter schools will get paid for the average number of at-risk kids they have," Merrifield said.

Charter school backers say the formula is flawed in several ways. King noted that traditional public schools do not get paid for the exact number of at-risk kids it has, with more of the funding going to secondary schools than elementary schools.

Mark Hyatt, president of The Classical Academy, said charter schools, unlike other public schools, have to pay an average of 20 percent of their overall perpupil funding on facility costs, meaning they have less to spend on education.

The panel made several other changes to the bill, including another amendment that indefinitely continues the annual formula for increasing the State Education Fund set out in Amendment 23, set to expire in 2011.

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