Paterson Public Schools are in trouble. To educate about 25,000 students, the proposed 2024-2025 budget is $710.4 million, $53.7 million more than last year, and would require an 8 percent increase in resident taxes. Why was there a big increase? Salaries and benefits would amount to up to $372 million, as would a variety of other items, including vocational programs, busing, out-of-district tuition for students with disabilities and charter school tuition increases. The district also has 140 teacher vacancies and relies largely on substitute teachers.
North Jersey reports that the Paterson Board of Education is considering changing its staff health insurance from Blue Cross/Blue Shield to Aetna to save money. However, there is an assumption that state support will increase by $34 million. Paterson Education Association President John McEntee said:
“McEntee said a sudden change in coverage would create instability that would ‘drive away talented individuals’ and undermine efforts to improve the quality of education in Paterson schools.” The union leader said some city teachers are “so desperate” they are conducting virtual job interviews from their cars during breaks in class.
‘The teachers are leaving. 'It's really sad,' Clara Basyurt, who teaches at School 25, told the school board last week. 'The reason is because of these things.''
Students are leaving too. Because parents have other options. Who can blame them? In Patterson District schools, 13.8% of third grade students are reading at grade level, a 1.6% decrease from last year despite federal emergency aid. 5.5% of sixth grade students are proficient in math.
But Paterson is home to six charter schools that have higher student achievement than traditional district schools despite serving more economically disadvantaged students. Here's one example: College Achieve Paterson, where 94% of students are low-income, 49.5% of third-grade students are proficient in reading (a 15-point increase from last year), and 34.8% of sixth-grade students are proficient in math ( (up 19 points from last year) So enrollment in Paterson's charter school sector has increased 67% over the past five years, from 3,677 in 2018 to 6,013 in 2023.
School districts must now send more state funds to charters to account for increased enrollment. (Unfortunately, New Jersey uses traditional school districts as a pass-through for charter tuition. Even though districts keep a percentage of their administrative costs, this is certainly a recipe for opposition.) This is a huge drain on districts' wallets, even though it never was. It feels like you're making money. First of all, it's local money. Next year, Paterson expects to allocate $123,434,158 in total tuition to the city's charter schools.
Last spring, the Paterson School Board hired a Memphis-based company to persuade parents to send their children back to the district. The Patterson Charter Schools Roundtable welcomed the district's hiring efforts, saying “the whole purpose of charter schools is to create competition among institutions.”
Patterson will also need to become more competitive in terms of teacher retention.