School costs could shift; Monadnock looks at charging parents

SWANZEY CENTER - Amid the debate swirling around the Monadnock Community Connections School is a central question: How do you pay for students from other districts once the grant that's been paying for them dries up.

On Tuesday night the school board answered:

"Basically, we're going to charge them tuition," said Eugene White, a Monadnock Regional School Board member from Swanzey, as he presented the board's policy committee's proposal to the rest of the board.

According to the plan, a student's family could have to foot the bill.

The Community Connections School, an alternative high school program in the Monadnock district, is partially funded through a school-choice grant that is set to run out this fall. Therefore, school board members were looking at who will pay for students who go to the school from other districts, as the grant currently covers their tuition.

According to the proposal presented Tuesday, out-of-district students attending Community Connections, or any other program funded through the grant, could remain in the program through a few different options.

The first would be a student-for-student swap between Monadnock and another district. If the student coming to Monadnock had a lower cost- per-student rate in his or her district, that district or the student's family would be required to pay the difference.

Without a swap, the student or the sending district would be responsible for the full cost of tuition to the high school.

But things got trickier when Douglas Lyman, a board member from Troy, brought up yet another question: What's the difference between the cost-per-student the state sets for the high school, and what district choice programs, such as Community Connections, actually cost?

And that brought a revision to the proposal from board member Karen Cota of Roxbury, who said any discrepancy between what Community Connections costs and what it costs to attend Monadnock High would be paid for by the parents or the district the student's from.

But what Community Connections actually costs still is up in the air, as estimates on the cost per student have varied by thousands of dollars.

"The question of how much (Monadnock Community Connections) actually costs is a moving target, based on how many students are actually in the program at any one time," said Jonathan Kenyon, a board member from Swanzey.

After the meeting, Kenyon described a "huge discrepancy" between numbers quoted by the Monadnock School Taxpayers Association, a group that has advocated closing the Community Connections program, and those quoted by the administration.

School board members who voted for Cota's amendment were: Phyllis T. Peterson of Fitzwilliam, James I. Carnie of Richmond, Tim Peloquin of Surry, Cota, Gerald Mazza, Kenneth P. Colby Jr., William S. Felton and Jonathan Kenyon - all of Swanzey - and Douglas Lyman of Troy.

Both White, chairman of the policy committee, and school board Chairman Colline Dreyfuss of Swanzey voted against the amendment.

Kenyon, who has voiced support for Community Connections, said he voted for the amendment because there needs to be a financial equity between students coming and going from the district.

"It doesn't matter what the numbers are anymore," Kenyon said. And instead of remaining bogged down with issues of cost, he said, "Now you can get onto the business of dealing with, 'Do we actually want to educate students this way.' And at the end of the day, that's the question."

Dreyfuss said she voted against Cota's proposal because she believes students who go to Community Connections School from other districts should be charged the same rate as those going to Monadnock Regional High School.

Community Connections is officially a program of the high school, she said, and not a separate entity.

"I believe that it is a program within the high school, and therefore we should charge the cost of the high school. Period. That's what we voted on. That's what the board has said all along," she said.

As for the potential now for there to be renewed confusion over whether Community Connections is a program or a separate school, Dreyfuss said, "There's a level of concern, but I'm optimistic, and I know that that program, as the other (choice) programs, (is) run very well. And I think people will see the benefit in those programs."

Kenyon said he didn't believe Tuesday night's decision threatened Community Connections' status.

"It's a program until it goes through the process and becomes a school," he said. "That's just the way it is."

And Kim Carter, director of Community Connections, emphasized that the cost discrepancies between the program and the high school may be less than some people represent.

"I think that's a key piece of making (Community Connections) sustainable, is that the costs (between it and the high school) have to not have the large discrepancies," she said. "Ultimately, (Community Connections) has to be sustainable on a similar per-pupil cost as any other program."