When is a Student Not a Student? Lawrence School Board Debates the Issue of Health Science Academy

With , the Lawrence Township Board of Education considered the tough question of which students truly are their responsibility.

Much of Monday night’s (Feb. 14) school board meeting was spent debating the Health Science Academy. The academy, a new high school program run by Mercer County Technical Schools in cooperation with Mercer County Community College, is a place that some Lawrence Township students have chosen to attend.

Located at the technical school district’s Assunpink Center on Old Trenton Road in Hamilton, the academy opened in September to offer a four-year program of specialized classes in health care fields. Students can earn up to 21 college credits by the time they graduate.

The issue with which the board is currently grappling is whether students who attend Health Science Academy should still be the responsibility – both financially and otherwise – of Lawrence Township Public Schools.

Parents of the academy students, meanwhile, adamantly believe their children are still part of the district and are concerned that their children may be denied from participating in sports and other extra-curricular activities.

Not counting transportation expenses, the township school district pays $7,500 toward tuition for each student who attends the academy.

“What I’m having trouble getting my mind around is these students were Lawrence High School students but they are now, according to the latest thing I’ve understood, not Lawrence High School students. They dis-enrolled,” board member Michael Brindle said. “I’m confused, then, why we are paying anything for them if they are not students in Lawrence High School? If the county wants to run this program – at their expense – absolutely go have a good time. But how does it fit in that we don’t count them as part of our enrollment, we don’t count them as part of our state-wide testing, [but] we have a liability if a kid is injured at that school because we’re paying half the cost?”

“As ever, we are responsible to the students and residents of the district, as we are responsible to the tax payers of the district, so that’s what this discussion is all about. And we’re stuck with this,” board member Bill Michaelson answered.

“We are responsible to the students of the district, but these are not students of the district,” Brindle argued. Later, speaking of the township being required by the state to provide the funding for the students who attend the academy, said it was “another unfunded mandate not thought out all the way through by those people who developed it – again, another example of the New Jersey Department of Education and its ineptitude, which I am getting to be less and less tolerant of the longer I sit in this seat – as should every resident of this state.”

“I agree. And we decided to make the best of it and we worked with the parents and the Health Science Academy since the summer and we treated the kids as our kids and that’s how we went into it,” Schools Superintendent Philip Meara said in response. “However, when the Oct. 15 count came out, which was the official count, we were directed by the county and the state to dis-enroll the kids – they were no longer ours. We don’t benefit from their test scores, we really don’t have anything to do with them. That’s when the ballgame changed. We’ve been wrestling with that since then, trying to figure out exactly what their status is and what that means to us.”

“I think the problem is we’re responsible for managing the budget given to us by the taxpayers of Lawrence yet we do not have authority over this portion of the budget and I think that’s what’s really troubling because it’s just coming out of our pockets with no managerial authority,” Michaelson said.

“I think that there’s a lot of confounding elements,” board president Laura Waters said. “I know everyone at this table is concerned with the students’ wellbeing. I know you can fight and say they’re not our kids, but they still live in Lawrence. They’re still Lawrence students. I think the upside of this messy situation is that it’s made us look hard at our high school program and say, ‘They’re offering something we’re not offering, what do we have to do to match that?’ Sometimes competition is healthy.

“The truth is we want our kids here,” Waters continued. “But the parents and their kids have a right to make a choice to go somewhere else. What do we have to do to make our program more appealing? If this program is the instigation for us to get there, then in the end it benefits all the kids. I’m not defending the academy and I’m not belittling the valid points you make. We really are about the kids. How can we make Lawrence High School the place where they want to go, where they choose to go even if they have an option to go elsewhere?”

“Money is very scarce and we are looking at potentially some Draconian cuts that will impact our students. And this is a lot of money,” board member Leon Kaplan said of the township district’s expenses for sending students to the academy.

After the meeting, Patch reached out to Lori Perlow, communications officer for Mercer County Technical Schools. She said tuition for Health Science Academy is the same for every school district in the county. “It’s not something that would typically fluctuate,” she said. “They’re given plenty of notice in terms of what the tuition is so they can budget accordingly.”

Many policies, such as academy students’ participation in after-school activities and tuition responsibility, are determined by state law and are not things that either school districts or the academy itself can decide, she said.

Parents of academy students are concerned about how the township school board will balance the interests of the students versus the district’s budget constraints.

Parent David Orent, speaking on behalf of a group calling itself the United Parents for Health Science Academy, spoke during the meeting’s public comment portion to request that the board create a formal policy on after-school activities for academy students.

“The administration of Lawrence Township Public Schools has done a notable job of working with Lawrence parents and students at the new Health Science Academy. There were numerous procedural and policy issues that have neither been anticipated nor resolved before the academy opened its doors this past September,” he said, noting that township school administrators have met with parents and academy officials several times in an effort “to clarify issues related to enrollment, transportation and participation in after-school activities at Lawrence High School.”

“While we are pleased that our children have been allowed to participate in after-school activities such as sports, going forward LTPS has not yet issued a formal statement of policy on participation in after-school activities by Lawrence public school children who attend the Health Science Academy fulltime,” Orent said.

“As you may know a children in the neighboring district in Ewing who attends the HAS was recently denied the opportunity to participate in a varsity sports program at their high school for this school year,” Orent continued. “The child’s parents filed an appeal for emergent relief with the New Jersey Department of Education. That appeal cited an earlier case in Rahway where a child attending a countywide magnet school there was denied the opportunity to participate in extra-curricular activities at Rahway High School. In that case, the administrative court law judge who reviewed the appeal ordered the district to comply [with the rules] governing the New Jersey Interscholastic Athletic Association. The district was further ordered to allow the student in question to fully participate in extra-curricular activities and athletic programs at Rahway High School unless it could find that such participation was not practical because of scheduling constraints, transportation costs, logistical difficulties or other valid considerations.

“Based on this precedent and other factors, the Ewing Board of Education made a settlement agreement with the student’s parents that the student shall be allowed to participate in athletic teams and other appropriate extra-curricular activities at Ewing High School so long as she remains a resident of the township and attends the county HAS,” Orent said.

Orent, on behalf of United Parents for Health Science Academy, asked the board to draft and adopt a policy allowing all Health Science Academy students from the township to participate in all after-school activities at Lawrence High School. Such a policy would benefit taxpayers and students, both current and future, by sparing the district the time and expense of having to respond to individual appeals that will be undoubtedly filed by parents of students not allowed to participate in sports and other extra-curricular activities.

“The legal expenses that result from having to respond to individual appeals are difficult to justify given the established case law on this issue and the low likelihood of a ruling in favor of any district that does not want to comply with the law,” Orent said in conclusion.

Even while the board was not shy about debating the hard facts and tough budget numbers involved in the issue, Waters wanted to assure parents that the students will not be forgotten. “I’m sure you didn’t enjoy parts of this conversation and I’m sorry for that,” she told them.

After the meeting, parent Robin Rapport said she felt some board members missed important aspects of the issue. “What detractors were quick to ignore was the fact that this is not a new idea by any stretch,” she wrote in an e-mail to Patch. “Many other counties have similar programs that are very successful and help prepare interested students for medical careers.”

Rapport stressed that students can graduate from the academy with 21 college credits – which is something that Lawrence High School does not offer.

“I am glad that the program is making the board re-evaluate their programs at the high school,” she wrote, “however, it is unfortunate to see them try to destroy an alternative program that is doing a superior job giving our students a chance for success.”

The Health Science Academy issue will likely come up again at the Feb. 24 budget meeting.

Minutes from the Feb. 14 school board meeting can be downloaded from the school district’s website. Audio recordings of the meeting can also be listened to via the website.