W.Va. charter board considering seeking same border privileges as traditional public schools

CHARLESTON – West Virginia’s small system of virtual and physical public charter schools is setting its sights on attracting students from border states if the legislature agrees to make changes to state law.

Barry Holstein, executive director of the state Professional Charter School Board (PCSB) briefed board members during a regularly scheduled virtual meeting Thursday morning about possible legislative priorities for the 2027 60-day regular session.

One of those items including asking lawmakers to make changes to state code to allow public charter schools in counties bordering neighboring states to be able to accept students from those states and receive tuition for those students.

“There was a question relative to if we have a border charter school in one of the border counties,” Holstein said. “The current West Virginia code would seem to indicate clearly that that (charter) school is not allowed to accept what would then be out-of-state tuition-paying students, but the non-charter public schools are afforded that opportunity.

“I think there’s a disconnect there that I would like to get just simply clarified and corrected in code if the board would be in agreement that that should be an option afforded the charter schools,” Holstein continued.

Board members raised questions about how tuition for out-of-state students would be charged. State code prohibits the charging of full-time tuition for in-state students who attend the state’s six brick-and-mortar public charter schools or the two statewide virtual charter schools. Charter schools may only charge the same tuition or fees that non-charter public schools can charge, such as for part-time enrollment in the Hope Scholarship educational voucher program or for participation in student activities.

In regard to the state’s 55-county public school systems, section 2.2d of state Department of Education Policy 8100 does allow counties to charge tuition to out-of-state students based on the per-capita cost per student, though it appears that each county handles this in different ways, including directly charging parents or sometimes charging school systems in neighboring states.

“I had been under the understanding that for our (out-of-state students) that there’s some cost associated with it versus a billing of the school system,” said PCSB member Latonia Page. “I’ll go back and check what that looks like for our counties, but I just wanted to make sure that there wouldn’t be a cost to the parent if they were exercising that model or should we expect there to be?”

“I reached out to a couple of counties and had this conversation on how they did it. And each of the counties that I spoke with are doing it differently,” Holstein said.

PCSB member Chanda Adkins asked whether allowing out-of-state students into West Virginia public charter schools would be burdensome should those schools be reimbursed in arrears.

“Some counties ... they do a reconciliation at the end of the year, so there’s not money up front. The money is recouped,” Adkins asked. “Is that going to hurt our counties or our schools because they actually do the way we do in billing, in a reconciliation at the end of the year for certain funding mechanisms?”

“I think it’s up to the county to make those agreements and arrangements for the accepting school,” Holstein said. “We’re under no obligation to accept the students from another state, but in doing so, I think it’s prudent for them to make those arrangements up front.”

House Education Committee Chairman Joe Statler, R-Monongalia, is a former Monongalia County Board of Education member and PCSB non-voting member. He said he believed it made sense to charge parents of out-of-state students tuition versus waiting on reimbursement from school systems outside of the state for those same students.

“Quite frankly, this alarms me ... I’m not sure that we depend upon an out-of-state entity paying the tuition to the state,” Statler said. “I don’t think it should be the West Virginia taxpayer paying the bill for out-of-state students if those are not being paid. So, this raises an alarm for me, not only at the charter level, but also at the public level, that this is a loophole we probably need fixed.”

The PCSB is celebrating five years as an authorizing body of new public charter schools. The board was created by the Legislature through House Bill 2012, passed during the 2021 regular session, as one of four authorizers for charter school applications along with a county board of education, two county boards of education for cross-county charter schools, and the state Board of Education under certain circumstances.

Public charter schools authorized by the PCSB are only subject to supervision by the state Board of Education when it comes to meeting standards for student performance. The board’s first meeting was Aug. 18, 2021.

The PCSB is reviewing renewal applications for West Virginia’s two statewide virtual charter schools – Virtual Preparatory Academy of West Virginia and West Virginia Virtual Academy. Eastern Panhandle Preparatory Academy in Kearneysville is also up for renewal.

A potential new physical public charter school -- the WISH Academy -- applied by the Aug. 31 deadline. The school plans to operate in the Huntington area, potentially on the Marshall University campus. A public forum and board interview are being scheduled.

House Bill 206, passed by the Legislature in 2019 and amended in 2021 by House Bill 2012, created the current public charter school pilot project. The pilot program allows for the approval of 10 public charter schools every three years and a limit of two statewide virtual charter schools.