On Thursday, March 15, 2012, the New Jersey Assembly approved one of the two charter school reform bills for which we have been advocating:
Assembly bill 1877 (bill A3852/S2243 last session), which requires local approval before the establishment of new charter schools.
The final vote was 46 yes; 5 abstentions; 27 no; 2 did not vote. See how individual Assembly members voted here.
Assembly bill 2147 (bills A3356/S3005/S3001 last session) is awaiting a vote of the full Assembly. This bill would increase charter school educational and financial accountability and transparency and address the fact that the students at most NJ charter schools do not represent the demographics of their sending communities.
Both bills are awaiting a hearing in the Senate Education Committee.
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On February 2nd, the Assembly Education Committee approved both of the charter school reform bills:
-Assembly bill 1877 (bill A3852/S2243 last session), which would require local approval before the establishment of new charter schools, and
-Assembly bill 2147 (bills A3356/S3005/S3001 last session), which would increase charter school educational and financial accountability and transparency and address the fact that NJ charter school students do not represent the demographics of their sending districts.
The next step is the full Assembly, which could take these bills up anytime.
For more details on this and other key education-related issues, please follow us on Facebook.
E-mail info@saveourschoolsnj.org with any questions.
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On June 29, 2011, the New Jersey Assembly overwhelmingly passed both of the charter school reform bills for which Save Our Schools NJ has been advocating.
Assembly bill 3852, which requires local approval for the establishment of new charter schools, received 47 yes votes; 17 no votes; and 14 abstentions.
Assembly bill 3356, which ensures that charter schools have financial and educational transparency and accountability and demographically represent their communities, received 72 yes votes; 6 no votes; and no abstentions.
Both bills received bi-partisan support. You can see how individual Assembly members voted. Click here for bill 3852 here and here for bill 3356.The next step for both bills is the State Senate. We will be working to ensure that the bills are heard as quickly as possible and will let you know how you can help to make that happen.
Save Our Schools NJ is working with lawmakers to reform three significant problems with the existing charter school law:
- Local communities have no control over the opening of new charter schools in their districts, even though the communities must pay to run those charter schools and the funds for doing so come out of the host districts’ school budgets.
- NJ charter school students do not represent the demographics of their sending districts. Charter schools educate very few English as a second language students, students who qualify for free lunch, or students with special needs. Each of these groups is more expensive to educate than the general population. Since charter schools reduce the resources that a district has to educate its students, districts with charter schools are left with fewer resources to meet the needs of a population of students that is more expensive to educate.
- The existing charter legislation does not provide needed financial and educational accountability and transparency.
