Lakewood, NJ – This isn’t the first time that questions have been raised about the Lakewood School District’s ballooning tuition payments to the School for Children with Hidden Intelligence.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
In 2002, an ad hoc committee of the Lakewood Board of Education looked at ways to make the district’s special-education program more cost-effective.
The committee was chaired by Arthur Godt, a local retiree who had spent 13 years as the special-education director in the Passaic school system.
“We made an honest effort to approach some of the problems, and the out-of-district tuition was one of them,” recalled Godt, 72.
The committee’s final report, citing the “inordinate number” of Lakewood students being placed at the privately owned and operated SCHI, said that there was “no valid reason why Lakewood should not develop appropriate special-education programs for these children.”
At the time, the district was spending approximately $2.5 million to send 53 students to SCHI, at an average tuition of $43,396.
The report called on the district to commit the resources to improve and expand its own special-education programs with a view toward bringing at least some of the students at SCHI back into the district. Doing so, the report stated, would be in keeping with federal and state special-education laws requiring that children with disabilities be educated in the “least restrictive environment,” ideally with their nondisabled peers at a local public school.
“The first line is always ‘public education first,’” Godt said. “Well, Lakewood doesn’t do that. They just automatically go to the private school.”
Godt said he wasn’t prepared for the reaction the report triggered.
A dissenting member of the committee, Rabbi Moshe Zev Weisberg, a member of Lakewood’s Vaad, the council of religious and community leaders that represents the interest of the township’s Orthodox Jewish community, called the report a “major misrepresentation and a complete rewrite” of a draft that had been circulated in the committee.
In a memo to the schools superintendent at the time, Ernest Cannava, Weisberg urged that Godt and another member of the committee who helped write the report “be sanctioned for a serious breach of professional behavior.”
“Having known both gentleman, I was truly shocked by their gross misconduct, especially with such sensitive issues,” Weisberg wrote. “My opinion is that they should both be removed from the committee and be barred from future official district committees.”
Godt said the school board accepted the report without comment, and he heard nothing more of it.
“To my knowledge, the report was just filed away,” he said.
Since that time, the district’s tuition payments to SCHI have increased nearly fivefold, to $12.2 million. Godt, for one, is hardly surprised.
“You didn’t have to have a special-education background to figure that one out,” Godt said. “It was going to snowball to what it is now.”
I don’t agree that they need to go through the public school system. The problem seems to be that the per child expense is astronomical. Maybe if they can explain how they are spending so much per student, we’d somehow feel a little better. I don’t think they could or would explain. Yeshivas don’t open their books. That whole system needs to change. Until then, the rich get richer.
i think lakewood and education should not be together in the same sentence
SCHi is the 3rd rail of Lakewood politics touch it and you are fried . This has to stop ! Nobody is advocating an end to services , just accountability . The minute you say something , right away “oh if only you would have a special needs child” . Every homeowner is paying hundreds of dollars in taxes to support SCHI shouldnt there be an exact accounting of how the money is spent and if it is really neccesary.
These kids deserve to be in a frum environment. Or do they? Would they know the difference?
Do we pay millions to make the patrents feel good?
“School for Children with Hidden Intelligence”??????The title is for parents who can’t accept that their child is not “normal”. When they accept that then perhaps they don’t have to worry about spending fortunes—Maybe it is just harder to love their child—
The Lakewood’s Board of Education has a responsibilty to the taxpayers to do an audit on the funds they have been dispensing to SCHI. The BOE and SCHI must have full tranceparency in order for the taxpayers to have some level of comfort.
I’m sure there are good reasons but just by looking at their tax returns ( guidestar ) I see that one of their fundraisers earns around 185k a year. Is it that difficult to walk to the Township building and pick up our tax money?
Also they pay the maintenance head 110k which is somewhat high end but not out of the ballpark . However why is there another 200k being billed by a “janitorial company” registered to the above mentioned employee’s home address?
All people want is open books
I have a child with special needs and I live in Brooklyn… my child attends public school. I can choose to send to Bonim Lamokom – a yeshiva type special ed school for $20, 000 annual tuition. Why should the people in Lakewood be different?? And, why does it cost sooooooooo much money per child?? BTW/ the public school – bilingual program does a far better job than anything else I’ve observed.
Once, twice, etc but there are too many unanswered questions re: the SCHI money.
Parents claim they are being charged exorbirant sums that they can’t handle, while all of it should have benn covered by the Government funds. Why are parents being fleeced? Please someone help. Without tranceparency and a full accounting to the Lakewood BOE, we should stop. We shoulldn’t be subjecting our beloved children to a question of “where is the erlichkeit”?
heres an idea: throw all the non-serious young men out of BMG and tell them to get jobs. Then, more people could afford tuition, and it would be less of a strain on everyone involved. And please, don’t feed me the BS that every young man is serious about his learning. Havent we seen enough stories where, as pirkei avos, says, learning without a job leads to avaira.
It is all very simple and somewhat corrupt. It seems that the arrangement that SCHI has with the Township is that the per student tuition is simply a formula of total expenses divided by the number of students. SCHI went out and built a multi million dollar building (every Mosad would love to do but can’t afford) and has now saddled the taxpayers with the bill. There is no checks and balances, there is no incentive to keep costs down, there is no incentive to have competitive salary. All this is done with the approval of the VAAD and the Oilam is a a Goilam! People are getting rich off of our money all in the guise of helping special children… I’d like to see how many of these people would work with special kids if they weren’t getting wealthy on our backs… unlike the dedicated teachers who truly love what they do and do it Lishma. This stinks to high ….
1) In Lakewood, “Normal” children over the age of 3 with minor issues can not get any therapy funded by the government. The only way to get it is by being enrolled in a special school. This is insane and costs the Lakewood taxpaers Millions! Instead of paying just for therapy they need to pay the cost of full schooling.
2) The local public school does not have any Jewish program, these kids that attend public school come home talking about Christmas and Thanksgiving. I have done work in SCHI and saw that there are MANY kids who are very normal with minor issues. These kids will be mainstreamed in a few years. So what is the option, send them to school with the amigos??
Posters not familiar with the Lakewood special education situation should just keep their foot in their mouths and not voice their silly comments.