CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM Students from Halau Ku Mana charter school held hands while singing "Aloha Oe" at a rally for charter schools yesterday at the state Capitol. The state provides no funding for charter school facilities, and only about half as much per-pupil funding as regular schools.

Charter schools
protest budget

Lawmakers propose reducing
funding for the struggling system

Mixing hula, Hawaiian chants and cries of "We need more money!" public charter school advocates called on lawmakers yesterday to budget an equal share of education funding to the state's 27 charter schools.

About 300 people from several schools, mostly students, rallied at the state Capitol, where legislators are crafting a budget that in its draft form would give the charter system several million dollars less than mandated under a state formula.

Many of the alternative schools are struggling already under the formula, which allocates the charter system about half the amount of per-pupil funding that regular public schools get.

"To meet the needs of our students, our teachers and our school, we need at least equal funding. That's all we're asking for, nothing more," said Makalapua Kaawa, principal of Hawaiian-immersion school Ke Kula O Samuel M. Kamakau, who called current funding levels "dismal."

Under a state formula, the charter schools are supposed to receive $37 million and $39 million in each of the next two years, said Jim Shon, executive director of the Charter School Administrative Office.

However, other priorities have whittled that down to around $32 million in each of the next two years, said Roy Takumi, House Education Committee chairman.

Takumi said the prospect of more charter school funding is uncertain. He noted that legislators already will have to fight to fund other vital Department of Education programs, such as bus systems and the school lunch program.

CINDY ELLEN RUSSELL / CRUSSELL@STARBULLETIN.COM Waialae Charter School students, faculty and supporters waved signs and chanted at a rally at the state Capitol yesterday. In the immediate foreground were Walton Pang, 9, Soo Han Bong, 10, and Tyler Burns, 9.

The impact of contract talks under way between the state and its public school teachers also is still unknown, he said.

"Our hope is to increase funding in a way that is equitable. But there are competing needs," Takumi said.

Charter schools are public schools that have their own school boards and operate under a charter, or contract, with the state that gives them broad autonomy over their affairs.

But the schools, which have been left to find their own facilities, have struggled with funding since most of them began operations about four years ago.

The funding squeeze could worsen in the next few years. A report released this week by the Charter School Administrative Office projects charter school enrollment will grow by 50 percent by 2009.

Enrollment was 4,964 for the current school year and is expected to grow to 7,335 by 2009, the report said.

Students and parents said they turned to the charter schools for their smaller teacher-student ratios, a family-like atmosphere and more relevant, hands-on learning.

"It's more like a family gathering than going to school," said Noelani Duffey, the only senior this year at Halau Ku Mana charter school.