Equal Access To a Good Education

I’m sure that we all can agree that the overwhelming majority of parents want the best education they can get for their children. Because of this some parents will lie about where they live; some change living arrangements during the school year; some have boundary changes forced upon them; and some are forced to go to the Supreme Court. The circumstances in each of these stories are different. Let’s explore each scenario and you’ll soon see why they all end up with the same conclusion.

First, I understand the motivation for those who lie about where they live. However, they are still not doing what is right. They would be better off speaking up for change in the system instead. Here are a few excerpts from the article.

If true, the family could owe Plainfield School District $252,500 in tuition reimbursement, Godinez said. The district currently spends about $8,300 per student annually.

Currently, Plainfield School District has 25 schools, one pre-school and one alternative school with three new schools on the way this fall — meaning there could be at least 300 students attending Plainfield schools when they shouldn’t be, costing the taxpayers about $2.5 million.

A Joliet family who sent their two children to Plainfield schools for 2½ years agreed to pay the district $250 a month for seven years to fulfill their debt of $21,000 in out-of-school district tuition.

These cases are just a sampling of what is suspected to be about 10 kids per school in this district. The reporter in this story only tells the side of the school. It talks about the cost to the taxpayers as being the full $8300 per year. This number is technically correct, but not the entire story. The amount spent per student comes from property taxes, state aid and federal monies. The portion that the family should be charged is only the amount of property taxes. This is because the school has been counting these students and received their federal and state monies because the students attended their schools. The story doesn’t say whether the school will be returning this money to the state or federal government, but I would venture to say they won’t. While they are claiming that the taxpayers are being robbed, they are in effect doing the very same thing by getting double money for these children, minus the property tax difference of course.

With the family of seven, Thorse said the district is looking into asking the Will County State’s Attorney office to press charges against the parents and perhaps the grandparents.

Not only will they go after the double money, they want criminal charges brought against some of the families.

“We just don’t go away. It’s not right to the taxpayers,” Thorse said. “We will file criminal charges against parents who knowingly violated the residency. I think there are some people who don’t know. I think there are some situations where people are naive and think they can go to any school they want and anywhere they want.”

I highlighted the last quote because of the irony. This school administrator is telling parents they don’t have the right to send there children to whatever school they want. He is defending a government run monopoly. The irony of this quote is that in America, the freest nation on earth, children are subjected to a closed system that prevents many parents the freedom to send their child to the best school they can find.

The second situation is a mother who started the year living with her mother and is ending the year back with her husband, of course in separate school districts. The children however were reportedly living with the grandmother, although this is disputed by the school district.

This has been a tough year for Dana Wekesa, a 28-year-old nurse’s aide from Kenosha. While trying to balance a job, college and a rocky marriage, her mother in Zion has helped care for her children since 2000.

Now, with only six weeks of school left, her two school-aged children are not allowed to attend Newport Elementary School in Wadsworth anymore because Beach Park School District officials determined they don’t live within district boundaries. They also slapped Wekesa with a bill for $9,156, because non-resident students have to pay $43 per day.

Wekesa argues that her children — a kindergartner and third-grader — have residency because they sleep at her mother’s house within the district.

“They stay there four to five days a week and two or three weekends out of the month,”

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