Strong District

Continuing the 3 Cornerstones, the Leader Telegram published the following essay on March 24, 2007. In addition, Volume One published this essay on March 8, 2007.

Educational Revenue

To balance a budget there are two sides to the equation, revenue and spending. Most, if not all the current School District budget discussion has been on cuts in spending. I would like to emphasis growth in revenue. The Eau Claire School District is not growing, but this trend can change. Presented recently in Milwaukee to the School Board at the 86th WASB-WASDA-WASBO State Education Convention, school choice is a necessity to grow a school district. A strong school district should have ties to the business community, each marketing the strengths of the other to foster growth for the city, district and financial sector. As an example, my family chose to move here from the Cities to have a stronger sense of community. I was working for 3M and had my choice of communities to transfer to. The number one factor we considered in our move was education. The presence of the Chippewa Valley Montessori Charter School made the choice clear. Since moving here, I have met others who made the same decision and an educational choice is what made these professionals chose Eau Claire. Strengthen the school district, provide alternative educational choice. How does educational choice increase revenue?

The number of home schooled children has increased by 12% since 1999, while the number of children in public school has increased by 1%. The Eau Claire Area School District has the largest percentage of home schooled children of the 10 major metro areas in the state. These 251 families have chosen to home school because of various reasons, but one is the lack of choice. One way to increase revenue in the school district is to provide an option for families that have chosen to remove funds from the district by home schooling. Each child that is home schooled or going to private school is a loss of $5884 to the district. If we could provide an alternative that even half the families would consider, the income to the district would be close to $1 million.

Another way to increase revenue is to open enroll students from outside the Eau Claire School District. Each student brought into the district provides an additional $5884. The Montessori Charter School has the highest percentage of open enrollment students in the district. Simply by providing an alternative, we have encouraged families to send their children to the district. The more choices a district has, the more revenue the district can create.

I hesitate to write this final section: A final way to increase revenue is to charge for “non-essential” items. The state of Wisconsin does not consider college education essential to an education, therefore it charges tuition. All day Kindergarten is not considered essential and I am aware of districts that charge for this option. 4K is not considered essential and tuition could be charged. I consider this fee-for-use system a poor option. I consider not only college, all day Kindergarten, and 4K essential to the education of our children, but I would prefer to expand the investment in our community by providing Early Childhood Family Education for all families from birth on to matriculation. This model of education is prevalent in Minnesota and has been shown to provide a financial return to the community.

Alternative school choice is essential to a sustainable district. To show stability for school choice, existing Charters must be strengthened. Eau Claire can grow, let’s invest in our future!

Thank you.

Mark David Miller

Please refer to the following policy report for more in-depth information regarding alternative education choice and the future of the Eau Claire area School District: http://www.frcec.org/pdf/Educationpdf/HomeSchoolWI.pdf