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When Jalisa Hawkins decided to transfer her daughter from one Beloit public school to another, the state cut the sum taxpayers spend on the child’s education by about 40% for no good reason.
Yet it’s true, of Hawkins’ daughter, her kindergartener brother, and the 519 others attending The Lincoln Academy, now in its second year.
Every one of the children will be there because his or her parents chose the school. But because they chose the independent public charter school, instead of defaulting to the local school district, the state will provide $9,264 per child. The Beloit Public Schools, by contrast, last year had $15,363 per child in taxpayer money for “current education costs,” not counting buildings, buses or breakfasts.
Does the state pay less because The Lincoln Academy isn’t really a public school? No. The state says it is, and it’s answerable to the University of Wisconsin.
“All children are welcome,” said Kristi Cole, the school’s president, and indeed state law requires nonselectivity. The school’s charter specifies it should reflect Beloit’s demographics, said Cole: “It was very purposeful. We went and knocked on doors,” sometimes with interpreters, since a nearly a third of their scholars are learning English.
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