Public schools are often lauded as the bedrock of democracy, especially when supporters claim that public schools take all comers. But the truth is that public schools aren’t open to all.
All too often, admission is only open to students whose families can afford to buy or rent a home inside the districts’ boundaries or pay transfer student tuition. In 33 states, students living outside a district’s boundaries can be barred from its schools simply because of their geographic location.
Most states permit some form of open enrollment, which lets students attend public schools other than their residentially assigned one. However, 24 states also let school districts charge tuition to transfer students.
This means that transfer students and their families can be on the hook for pricey public school tuition. For instance, Clayton School District in Missouri charged the families of non-resident students in kindergarten through the fifth grade $18,300 and those in the sixth through 12th grades $19,400 for the 2023-24 school year.
In Virginia, Reason Foundation found that the average tuition rate in 72 school divisions that permitted cross-district transfers was $4,000, with rates peaking at $24,000 per student at Meridian High School in Falls Church.
At the same time, New York’s Tuxedo Union Free School District charged non-resident students in the seventh through 12th grades $11,000 annually for the 2022-23 school year. Yet this pales in comparison to the $20,200 charged annually by Pelham Public Schools that same year.
In cases like these, tuition makes schools out of reach for many students, especially those from low-income families.
Sometimes, neighboring school districts establish special agreements to pay tuition for each other’s transfer students. Proponents might argue that these dollars help offset the costs of new students, but in many instances, it’s clear that districts are selling seats to rake in extra cash.
For example, when Dacia Mumford was elected in 2022 to the school board of the West Lafayette Community School Corporation in Indiana, she discovered that the district’s superintendent used transfer tuition funds as a “slush fund” for travel and other dubious expenses.
She found that tuition funds were diverted to a “Promotion of Schools/RATM” fund which were funneled to credit cards used at the superintendent’s discretion. Mumford found that he used these funds to pay for various travel expenses, including a trip overseas.
“The April 2019 credit card statement shows $14,837 in payments to a travel agency for what seems to be the trip to London, though the destination is redacted,” Mumford wrote in a September 2022 blog post. “There are also charges for a couple of thousand-dollar meals and several hotel rooms in Philadelphia that appear to be part of a trip for school board members.”
With the school board’s approval, these funds paid for the superintendent’s and others’ travel to a London concert in celebration of new school buildings, one of which, Mumford noted, was named after a performer’s family member.
Moreover, these purchases occurred the same month the school board voted to fire all first-year teachers at the district’s elementary and middle schools to save costs.
While most school districts have better oversight of transfer student tuition funds, this example highlights how some are willing to sell their seats for the right price.
However, state policymakers are beginning to take note and recognize that charging families public school tuition is an oxymoron. Last year, state policymakers in Montana and North Dakota established laws stopping school districts from charging tuition to students using open enrollment.
This year, Indiana policymakers followed suit. Gov. Eric Holcomb signed H.B. 1380 into law which stops school districts from charging transfer students public school tuition or any other fee associated with the transfer.
This is a major victory for the 87,000 students in Indiana who use open enrollment or some other transfer mechanism to attend a public school other than their residentially assigned one.
This reform is long overdue, since Indiana’s constitution guarantees that public schools are open to all students. Yet, in practice, school districts could bar their doors to transfer students who can’t pay the price of admission.
Indiana’s new law ensures that school districts cannot use open enrollment to sell seats, making Indiana the 26th state where public schools are free to all students. Policymakers in the remaining 24 states should follow suit and ensure that public education isn’t free in name only.
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