After Gov. Mikie Sherrill told each school district how much money it will get from the state in her new budget, Republicans once again are arguing that New Jersey should cut aid to some urban systems, especially those that have persistently failed to show strong student progress.
Democrats have fought them off every year, partly because they have the votes to protect such spending, and partly because state Supreme Court rulings require it.
Suppose, though, that Republicans get their way, as Sherrill proposes a record $12.4 billion in school aid — 20% of her overall state spending for 2027. How would it work? We asked the GOP’s top budget expert in the Senate, Declan O’Scanlon, to make his case and wrestle with some of the tough questions his plan raises.
Start with this: Everyone agrees that some urban districts, like Union City, have used the money to great effect, raising test scores and graduation rates, matching or exceeding student performance in some suburbs. But other urban districts, like Asbury Park, spend huge sums of money and still fail. Newark falls in between those two.
In Union City, which spends about $23,000 per pupil, 56% of fourth graders can read on grade level and 46% can do math adequately. In Asbury Park, which spends about $33,850 per pupil, just 13% are reading on grade level and 8% are proficient in math.
O’Scanlon’s answer is to cut spending in some urban districts, and shift a portion of the savings to successful suburban districts that he says do more with less. If there’s anything left over, he says, it would be devoted to reducing the state’s structural deficit.
He spoke recently with NJ Spotlight News. Below is an edited transcript.
Julie O’Connor: How do you back up the core claim that districts like Asbury Park are wasting money?
Sen. Declan O’Scanlon: Asbury Park and Newark can achieve better results with less. How do I prove that? Red Bank is a great example. It spends less, about $23,000 per pupil. Maybe Asbury and Newark have marginally more challenges, but not dramatically more. And there doesn’t seem to be all that much correlation between money and outcomes.
To be fair, we know it costs a certain amount to educate children. And Asbury and Newark are a little different, because Asbury has had slashes to its budget in the last few years. But it is obvious with these examples that there’s a way to do more for these kids with less money.
Because New Jersey is in such precarious fiscal shape, because it’s good government, we owe it to the kids in those districts and others that have had massive funding cuts to examine this. There’s nothing rich versus poor about it, nothing racist about it. It’s: How do we serve everyone better?
JO: Are you calling for cuts in all urban districts, even those that are doing well?
Credit: Courtesy of Declan O’ScanlonDO: No. The state Department of Education has got to do the hard work of going into these districts and taking a look at where we’re getting a good bang for our buck and where we’re not. We’ve got to first, increase the quality of education, and second, make sure we’re doing it with exactly the amount of money that we need and not a dollar of taxpayer money more.
My first choice in all of this was to bend the curve and fix the formula a few years ago, and simply increase the aid of these urban districts at a slower pace and to a lower level. Now that we have fully funded the school funding formula, it makes reform much more difficult. But we’re starting a new administration, so let’s look at it.
JO: How would cutting state aid affect students in urban districts?
DO: I don’t think it would at all. From a 60,000-foot level, eight years ago, we increased our school spending by 50%, from $8 billion to over $12 billion, and the lion’s share of that $4 billion in extra aid went to a handful of districts. We overwhelmed them with more money, to the point that they have no idea how to spend it. That is tragic when you have a couple hundred districts choking on fumes, slashing programs, increasing class sizes and completely eliminating extracurricular activities, doing true damage to kids’ educations.
JO: How would increasing aid to suburban districts help students?
DO: If you were to bend the curve and simply give less increased aid to some of these urban districts awash in cash, it’s amazing: They could figure out how to live within their means, partnering with community entities. Red Bank is a great example. It has lived on much lower levels of aid forever.
You do much more damage when you take away money that has been built into the school district for years than you do in simply reducing the amount you’re increasing by, because the district is like an alligator. Alligators grow to the size of the container you keep them in. You have an alligator in an aquarium in your house, it won’t grow to 8 feet. In the wild, it will grow to 12 feet. Public entities, municipalities, schools – every dollar they could spend, they’re going to spend. They’re going to build programs around it and get invested in it.
Now, let’s flip to the suburban districts – Toms River, Bayshore – that are getting massive cuts. You would prevent them from having to slash all these programs they built into their budgets: extracurriculars, music, sports. They were given money, they were forced to spend it because we capped the amount they can keep in surplus. They created programs, and now you want to slash that dramatically. It’s much easier to stop the alligator from growing in the first place.
JO: Aren’t you conceding that money is important to school performance? Isn’t that true in districts like Asbury Park and Newark as well?
DO: There is no firm correlation between money and quality of education; but there is some, and when you’re manipulating money, it will make an impact. If we’re going to argue that we can’t increase or decrease anywhere, well, then we’re doomed. Because we already have a $4 billion structural deficit, and we’ve got school districts that are on the verge of turning lights out and dropping their keys off at Drumthwacket.
JO: The state Supreme Court has ruled over and over that providing a decent education to all children is a state responsibility in the end, not a local one. What can the state do to improve schools in a district like Asbury Park? Is the state doing enough, today, to oversee their use of this money?
DO: No. After Asbury Park got cut in the last few years, they’re still spending so much money that it would not surprise me at all if you could find areas to spend less. And when the people of New Jersey outside of Newark provide 80% of the funding for that outrageously expensive school district and the kids are getting crappy educations, it’s obvious we’re not doing enough. When you see lavish parties thrown by these districts – and certainly, Newark is an example; Asbury Park I don’t think is – when you see $1 million being parked in your travel budget in Newark, that’s insane. I’ve spoken to people in Asbury Park who say that is insane.
JO: Is your goal here to fix the problem by improving education in districts like Asbury Park? Or are you just trying to make that crisis less costly to state taxpayers?
DO: Our first goal as compassionate human beings, wanting to create the next generation of qualified, successful, happy people, has to be ensuring a good education in Asbury Park and Newark and the other top 10 schools that are way underperforming. But money obviously hasn’t been a solution, because we’ve done that – load more money into these places – without much improvement at all. That gets back to the counter argument that yes, money makes the difference, but there is no direct correlation. The first goal has to be quality of education, but there has to be, alongside it, expenses taxpayers can sustain. Right now, we have neither one.
JO: What about long-term outcomes in urban districts? I spoke to an economist whose research found that kids exposed to more school spending earn more as adults — that it’s worth it because you’re getting that money back into the economy.
DO: I say correlation only works when you actually have kids who are performing. If you’re getting out of school and can’t read or do basic math, and you’ve had millions spent on your education, I don’t think that’s sound. If you’re pumping billions into the school system and the kids are some of the worst performing, sorry, it’s a disservice to those kids.
JO: Finally, how do you cut aid to urban districts without violating state Supreme Court rulings? The state, with Democrats in control, has lost in court virtually every time they try to cut spending on urban education. So, is this a pointless fight?
DO: When Governor Murphy was elected, I think we could have modified the school funding formula in a way that would pass muster with the current Supreme Court. The court never said you couldn’t revisit this; it’s the standard that’s enshrined in our constitution of a “thorough and efficient” education. That is somewhat amorphous, and we can prove to the court now that we spent a lot of money on some of these districts and there was no change in performance. I think we could have made the case that there’s a better way to do this. We could have saved hundreds of millions with less of an increase in Newark. It’s harder to take that much money away now, because the programs are built. Look, I have to remain an optimist, because I care about these kids, and I care about the taxpayers. But it’s much more difficult.
