Wareham School Committee reconsiders school choice participation
Joyce Bacchiocchi, left, and Apryl Rossi at the Thursday, March 19 School Committee meeting. Photo by Grace Roche
Joyce Bacchiocchi, left, and Apryl Rossi at the Thursday, March 19 School Committee meeting. Photo by Grace Roche
While participating in school choice — the option for students to apply for attendance at schools outside the district they live in — is standard across Massachusetts, districts can elect not to accept outside students.
At its Thursday, March 19 meeting the School Committee discussed whether to continue accepting students through the program for another year, and chose to table the issue until a future meeting.
Although districts are able to decline out-of-district students, according to state law districts can’t prevent their students from choosing to attend another school.
When students are accepted to other districts through school-choice, the sending district pays for their education. This means for every student that enrolls at a non-Wareham public school, the district loses money.
Committee member Joyce Bacchiocchi asked her fellow members to wait to vote on the issue until they heard from district principals. She said the committee heard from each principal and voted separately on the elementary, middle and high schools before voting last year.
“The principals aren't here, so that's unfortunate, because I would like to hear from them like we did last year about what their opinion is on school choice at their schools,” Bacchiocchi said.
She said she also wants to wait until the budget has been finalized to inform the committee on the necessity of accepting more students.
Member Apryl Rossi opposed Bacchiocchi’s request. She said while she values the input of the principals she believes it is important to accept school-choice students in order to bring funds into the district, especially with the number of students opting out of Wareham schools.
“We would then, in turn, receive the funding for the ones that choose to come here to offset that,” Rossi said. “I feel like it would be foolish of us, fiscally, to deny receiving students that want to get an education in our district.”
Committee Chair Geoffrey Swett said high school principal Scott Palladino opposed participating in school-choice last year. He said this opposition stemmed from concerns that “difficult children to educate” attended the high school through the program.
The committee will continue its discussion on school choice at an upcoming School Board meeting.
