Florida: Defunding and closing Public schools while Encouraging The Building of More Private Options.
Quick summary:
The IMPORTANT difference between closing a public school and closing a private or charter school is that when a PUBLIC SCHOOL CLOSES, the district will ensure that EVERY student has a seat in another public school and transportation to their new school.
When a private or charter school closes, sometimes overnight, FAMILIES ARE ON THEIR OWN to find a new school option for their child. When the responsibility for education is privatized, the responsibility for their child’s education begins and ends with them.
Two hurricanes in two weeks. Florida communities are hurting and recovery will take a while. One thing is certain (for now), public schools will be there for the recovery. When storms hit, Florida’s public schools turn into shelters from the storm. When Milton was barreling down on the Gulf Coast, calling for the mandatory or voluntary evacuation of nearly 5.5 million people, public schools across the state opened as shelters for evacuees. During the recovery, public schools will serve as relief centers, collecting and distributing what the community needs. Many times, the re-opening of schools after a severe storm is the first glimmer of hope that the community will recover. Public schools are a public good and serve their communities in ways that private options do not.
This is a blog about school closures and what the impact of declining birthrates and shifting demographics will have on public schools in a state (Florida) that is diverting funding away from public schools while continuing to fund the establishment of more and more publicly funded (but privately managed) charter schools and tax-funded (via vouchers) private schools, neither of which are designed (or expected) to serve the entire community.
Across the country, according to a recent report by by Bellwether, the primary factor affecting declining school enrollment is a reduction in the U.S. birth rate, which means fewer children are in communities to begin with. The decline in birth rates started in 2008, coinciding with the Great Recession. Between FY13 and FY22, the national birth rate decreased by 14%. Every state reported declining birth rates during this same time frame. Florida’s birth rate ranks as the 10th lowest among states. Combining the declining birth rates with America’s aging Baby Boomer population means that, by 2030, older adults are projected to outnumber kids for the first time in U.S. history. Florida currently has the second largest senior population in the U.S. behind California.
Rising costs of living (particularly housing) affects where families, and students, live. In many Florida communities, the cost of living has skyrocketed and young parents can no longer afford to raise their children in the same neighborhoods they grew up in. The net migration of individuals into Florida, at a rate of about 1,000 individuals each day, puts additional pressure on the housing supply.
Creating plans to open, close, consolidate or repurpose public schools is nothing new. School boards, with oversight over district budgets and as stewards of public tax dollars, must make difficult decisions to balance the needs of their local communities, their students and the financial health of their district. Often, school districts are their community’s largest employer and one of the largest land owners. Since public school properties were purchased with tax dollars and remain a valuable community asset, these are important decisions for any community.
In the Florida Keys, we have a history of repurposing our former public schools into county libraries, public parks, health department clinics and Key West City Hall.
In 1923, Key West High School opened in what is now Key Wesy City Hall. The local newspaper celebrated the neoclassical style building as a “magnificent and commodious structure, which will now afford Monroe County such an excellent high school, taking place with the many other institutions of learning throughout the state.” The 21,000 gallon cisterns that stored fresh water for the school prior to the creation of the Keys pipeline, which brings freshwater from the mainland, are still used for irrigation. When the Key West high school was moved to its current location on Flagler Avenue in 1961, the building was repurposed, first as a middle school and later as Glynn Archer Elementary school. In 2013, the school board consolidated schools and handed the building back to the City, which renovated it into today’s City Hall. The iconic tiger mascot remains. Today, Monroe County School Board meetings are held in the auditorium.
Recently, the narrative in Florida is that public schools are under-utilized because familes are fleeing to other “school choice” options. I encourage you to be skeptical of that narrative. Across the country, enrollments are declining but Florida’s public schools remain the predominant choice for most of Florida’s families. The most recent data since expansion to Universal Voucher in 2023, record numbers of students applied for vouchers but only 13% came from public schools. Overwhelmingly, the new voucher funding is going to students and families outside the public school system.
Florida’s public schools face extra enrollment pressures because our state has chosen to fund three separate systems of publicly funded schools creating an excessive number of “seats” for the number of school-aged children. While districts are required to obtain permission from the Department of Education and a Certificate of Need (based on census data, ensuring there will be students), charter schools are encouraged open anywhere (even across the street from an existing public school) and private schools have no essentially restrictions.
Funding competing systems of schools with varying oversight is probably not a fiscally responsible use of scare tax dollars but it certainly complicates a public school districts’ ability to responsibly plan for the future, especially when many disatisfied voucher recipients (two-thirds) return to public schools within 3 years.
In public school districts, it is not uncommon for schools to open and close with population and demographic shifts. A neighborhood that once had lots of families, now may house primarily retired individuals. Schools Boards are constantly re-evaluating attendance zones due to these shifting populations and often it makes fiscal sense to combine schools and repurpose buildings for something else. As public entities, such decisions usually follow rounds of (often passionate) publiic meetings. Public schools serve as the center of their communities and these decisions are not taken lightly.
Of course, private options are not immune to closures either. Indeed, reports show that start-up private schools, those opening just to cash in on the new voucher pay-out, have an average survival time is just 4 years before their doors close for good.
A recent report, “Doomed to Fail,” from the Network for Public Education and they National Center for Charter School Accountability highlighted the “enormous risk” parents take when they enroll their children in charter schools, noting that charter schools close at far higher rates than public schools and those closures are often “chaotic and abrupt”: “Will their kindergartener’s school still exist next year or when they are in grade five? Will their high school student’s school be offering diplomas come graduation year? Or will it be boarded up?”
The report noted “Based on a marketplace model with fewer regulations, the charter sector is far more unstable than local public schools. Some schools that close have been open for only a few months, while others close after serving communities for ten years or more. Year-to-year closure rates do not indicate the longevity of schools and, therefore, provide limited information.’
Charter schools in Florida close, primarily due to financial issues, at an alarming rate. With a reported failure rate of 40%, Florida ranks No. 2 in the country for charter school closures. Notably, the tax-paying public is not involved in decisions to close charters or private schools. Indeed, parents may not learn their child’s school is closing until they see the “Closed” sign on the door.
The IMPORTANT difference between closing a public school and closing a private or charter school is that when a PUBLIC SCHOOL CLOSES, the district will ensure that EVERY student has a seat in another public school and transportation to their new school.
When a private or charter school closes, sometimes overnight, FAMILIES ARE ON THEIR OWN to find a new school option for their child. When the responsibility for education is privatized, the responsibility for their child’s education begins and ends with them.
Also, as private enterprises, when a charter or private school closes, those properties are rarely, if ever, repurposed for the public good, regardless of whether they were paid for with public funds. Since 2023, Florida’s school districts have been required to sharely local property tax millages, intended for capital projects, with their charters schools, at a per pupil apportionment (approaching $300 million/year across the state). For the record, charter schools do not need to be built to the same safety standards as district-managed public schools.
In a recent blog post, Step Up For Students, the publicly funded non-profit that manages Florida’s voucher programs, hinted at the need to similarly share capital funds to allow the establishment of religious private schools:
“With Florida’s existing Jewish schools at or near full capacity, more effort is needed to source suitably sized school buildings… Without legislative and regulatory action to reduce the hurdles to opening new schools, the lack of school building space may throttle growth in Florida’s Jewish day schools.”
https://nextstepsblog.org/2024/08/special-report-floridas-jewish-schools-are-booming-fueled-by-families-using-school-choice-scholarships/
While voucher advocates lobby for more funding for Jewish day schools and yeshivas in the upcoming legislative session, I would recommend you familiarize yourself with this 2022 New York Times investigation: “In Hasidic Enclaves, Failing Private Schools Flush With Public Money” which highlights just what could go wrong when $1 billion in government funding is invested in schools lacking accountability and outside oversight.
In a time of declining student populations, should we be expanding the use of tax dollars to build multiple systems of publicly funded schools? Should capital funding be used to build schools in areas that don’t need them? Why is Florida continuing to financially entice out of state charter chains to expand in communities with declining enrollments? How can school districts responsibly plan in such a chaotic environment?
At Tuesday’s State Board of Education meeting, board members celebrated the work of public schools and their employees during Helene and Milton and their aftermath, which leaves one final question: Who will provide these vital community services when our public schools are gone?