No publicly-funded school has an 'obligation' to service students of
parents who have voluntarily sent their children to private
schools. Yes, the parents 'pay taxes', which go for many things
besides schools....police, fire, roads, etc. On the other hand,
public schools are funded on the basis of the students they directly
serve, i.e the average daily attendance figures (ADA)... so much
money each year per student attending. This also includes Federal
funding.... so many dollars per eligible student served in special
programs per year. The students in the private school across the
street are NOT generating ANY income for your school. Those parents
and that school are in effect asking for a free ride. Ask them
(politely) if your students could come and use their bathrooms each
day (and of course, you would not provide any toilet paper, soap, or
cleaning services), or if they could come and borrow the desks and
chairs from several of the classrooms at the Christian school. After
all, that is exactly what they are asking to be able to do...use
resources they did not pay for and deny them to those who did.
I would stress to your principal the smallness of your budget and the
thin-ness of your resources...along with the fact that every book
borrowed by the kids across the street is one less for his or her
school's students to use.
Sorry, but this is a sore point with me. Implicit in the action of
voluntarily removing your children from a public school and sending
them to a private school is the acceptance of the fact that you are
also giving up any claim on services provided by the public school.
At 09:39 AM 10/17/2005, you wrote:
>Our public school library has been asked if the kids
>from a Christian school across the street may come over to check out books
>from our library.
Mark Williams
Consulting Librarian
Professional Services for Conferences, Districts, Workshops
markwilliams@makaw.net
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