Opinion ID: 1898472
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Quality of Education in the Poorer Urban Districts

Text: The primary basis for our decision is the constitutional failure of education in poorer urban districts. The record demonstrates beyond debate that a thorough and efficient education does not exist there. Our conclusion that the constitutional mandate has not been satisfied is based both on the absolute level of education in those districts and the comparison with education in affluent suburban districts. Plaintiffs' proofs of the significantly inferior quality of education in poorer urban districts are persuasive. While exceptions exist, at the extremes  and its strength is limited to the extremes  the comparison between the education offered to students in poorer urban districts with that offered in the richer districts is impressive. The characteristics of a substantive education are most difficult to prove; short of intensive examination of education in progress, at the school, in the classroom, proofs are necessarily circumstantial. The State did not insist that the only true measure of substantive education was on-the-scene observation, but rather that even accepting plaintiffs' evidence at face value, it fell short. The State's objections were of various kinds: it noted that the comparisons were largely limited to the extremes, the richest against the poorest, the very best against the very worst; evidence was lacking in most cases that would warrant a reliable comparative conclusion. Furthermore, the State claims that the adequacy of the education that was being afforded in poorer districts was not acknowledged. The State's basic objection is that the various circumstantial measures, such as course offerings, experience and education of the staff, and pupil/staff ratio cannot be considered reliable indicators of the quality of education. In this connection we note the ALJ's description of the issue as whether a thorough and efficient education is measured by equal finances and programs, as contended by plaintiffs, or by student achievement, as contended by the Commissioner and the Board. While we have continued to adhere to our prior decisions that equalization is constitutionally required only up to a certain level  that necessary to achieve a thorough and efficient education  and that districts may exceed that level, we do not foreclose the possibility that changing circumstances, including future development of education in this state, may lead to an interpretation of the constitutional obligation as requiring such equality of funding. Concerning the poorer urban districts, however, we have found a constitutional failure of education no matter what test is applied to determine thorough and efficient. The State's position that thorough and efficient should be measured against the Act and the goals adopted by the Board rather than by input, i.e., course offerings, teacher/pupil ratios, and expenditures per pupil, suggests the inherent difficulties in determining the scope of the constitutionally mandated education. For most of the goals adopted by the Board, there are no tests to determine their accomplishment. With only standardized tests that measure but a few of them, we are left without any feasible method of applying the State's measure of thorough and efficient. We note initially that there was little direct proof of substantive education, such as course offerings, for the overwhelming number of districts in the state. On this record, most of the state's districts  except the poorer urban ones  may be offering an education in full compliance with the constitutional mandate. However, the level of education offered to students in some of the poorer urban districts is tragically inadequate. Many opportunities offered to students in richer suburban districts are denied to them. For instance, exposure to computers is necessary to acquire skills to compete in the workplace. In South Orange/Maplewood school district, kindergarteners are introduced to computers; children learn word processing in elementary school; middle school students are offered beginning computer programming; and high school students are offered advanced courses in several programming languages or project-oriented independent studies. Each South Orange/Maplewood school has a computer lab. By contrast, many poorer urban districts cannot offer such variety of computer science courses. While Princeton has one computer per eight children, East Orange has one computer per forty-three children, and Camden has one computer per fifty-eight children. Camden can offer formal computer instruction to only 3.4% of its students. In many poorer urban districts, computers are purchased with federal or state categorical funds for use in remedial education programs. Paterson offers no computer education other than computer-assisted basic skills programs. Further, many of these districts do not have sufficient space to accommodate computer labs. In Jersey City, computer classes are being taught in storage closets. Science education is deficient in some poorer urban districts. Princeton has seven laboratories in its high school, each with built-in equipment. South Brunswick elementary and middle schools stress hands-on, investigative science programs. However, many poorer urban districts offer science classes in labs built in the 1920's and 1930's, where sinks do not work, equipment such as microscopes is not available, supplies for chemistry or biology classes are insufficient, and hands-on investigative techniques cannot be taught. In Jersey City and Irvington, middle school science classes are taught without provision for laboratory experience. In East Orange middle schools, teachers wheel a science cart into a three-foot-by-six-foot science area for instruction. The area contains a sink, but no water, gas, or electrical lines. The disparity in foreign-language programs is dramatic. Montclair's students begin instruction in French or Spanish at the pre-school level. In Princeton's middle school, fifth grade students must take a half-year of French and a half-year of Spanish. Most sixth graders continue with one of these languages. Many begin a second language in the ninth grade, where four-year programs in German, Italian, Russian, and Latin are offered. French and Spanish are offered on two tracks, one for students who began instruction in middle school and the other for those who begin in the ninth grade. Advanced placement courses are available. In contrast, many of the poorer urban schools do not offer upper level foreign language courses, and only begin instruction in high school. Jersey City starts its foreign language program in the ninth grade; Paterson begins it at the tenth grade. Most Jersey City high schools offer only two languages; both of Paterson's high schools offer only Spanish and French, although the two Paterson high schools share one German teacher and one Latin teacher. Music programs are vastly superior in some richer suburban districts. South Brunswick offers music classes starting in kindergarten; Montclair begins with pre-schoolers. Millburn and South Brunswick offer their middle school students a music curriculum that includes courses such as guitar, electronic-piano laboratory, and music composition on synthesizers. Princeton offers several performing groups, including bands, choruses, and small ensembles. However, Camden and Paterson do not offer a music course until the fourth grade; only introductory level music courses are offered in high school. In 1981, Camden eliminated all its elementary school music teachers and provided helpers to assist in teaching music. Many poorer urban school districts have inadequate space for instrumental music lessons, bands, and choruses. In one elementary school in Jersey City, instrumental music lessons are provided in the back of the lunchroom. At lunchtime, the class moves to an area in the school's basement. Art programs in some poorer urban districts suffer compared to programs in richer suburban districts. In Montclair, the art program begins at the pre-school level; there is an art teacher in every elementary school; every school has at least one art room; and the district has purchased a variety of art equipment, such as a kiln for ceramic artwork. In contrast, art programs in some poorer urban districts are sparse. There are no art classrooms in East Orange elementary schools, and art teachers, who must travel from class to class, are limited in the forms of art they can teach. Jersey City has an excellent art program for gifted children; however, the regular art program can now accommodate only 30% of the district's students. In South Brunswick school district, the industrial-arts program includes an automotive shop, a woodworking shop, a metal shop, a graphics shop, and a greenhouse for a horticultural course. The vocational education program has a computer drafting laboratory and a graphics laboratory with a darkroom. In Camden, state-of-the-art equipment is not purchased; the old equipment in the classrooms is not maintained or repaired. There have even been problems heating the industrial-arts wing of the school. Physical education programs in some poorer urban districts are deficient. While many richer suburban school districts have flourishing gymnastics, swimming, basketball, baseball, soccer, lacrosse, field hockey, tennis, and golf teams, with fields, courts, pools, lockers, showers, and gymnasiums, some poorer urban districts cannot offer students such activities. In East Orange High School there are no such sports facilities; the track team practices in the second floor hallway. All of Irvington's elementary schools have no outdoor play space; some of the playgrounds had been converted to faculty parking lots. In a middle school in Paterson, fifth- and sixth-graders play basketball in a room with such a low ceiling that the net is placed at the level appropriate for third-graders. Many of these poorer urban districts are burdened with teaching basic skills to an overwhelming number of students. They are essentially basic skills districts. In 1985, 53% of Camden's children received remedial education; in East Orange, 41%; in Irvington, 30%. By contrast, only 4% of the students in Millburn school district received remedial education. A thorough and efficient education also requires adequate physical facilities. N.J.S.A. 18A:7-5f. We held in Robinson I that [t]he State's obligation includes ... capital expenditures without which the required educational opportunity could not be provided. 62 N.J. at 520, 303 A. 2d 273. The Legislature's appropriations for renovation of deteriorating school buildings and construction of new facilities, although substantial, do not approach the estimated $3 billion needed for a complete upgrade of the school facilities in this state. Many poorer urban districts operate schools that, due to their age and lack of maintenance, are crumbling. These facilities do not provide an environment in which children can learn; indeed, the safety of children in these schools is threatened. For example, in 1986 in Paterson a gymnasium floor collapsed in one school, and in another school the entire building was sinking. According to East Orange's long-range facility plan there are ten schools in immediate need of roof repair, fifteen schools with heating, ventilation or air conditioning problems; two schools that need total roof replacement; nine with electrical system problems; eight with plumbing system problems; thirteen needing structural repairs; seventeen needing patching, plastering or painting; and thirteen needing asbestos removal or containment. In an elementary school in Paterson, the children eat lunch in a small area in the boiler room area of the basement; remedial classes are taught in a former bathroom. In one Irvington school, children attend music classes in a storage room and remedial classes in converted closets. At another school in Irvington a coal bin was converted into a classroom. In one elementary school in East Orange, there is no cafeteria, and the children eat lunch in shifts in the first floor corridor. In one school in Jersey City, built in 1900, the library is a converted cloakroom; the nurse's office has no bathroom or waiting room; the lighting is inadequate; the bathrooms have no hot water (only the custodial office and nurse's office have hot water); there is water damage inside the building because of cracks in the facade; and the heating system is inadequate. In contrast, most schools in richer suburban districts are newer, cleaner, and safer. They provide an environment conducive to learning. They have sufficient space to accommodate the childrens' needs now and in the future. While it is possible that the richest of educations can be conferred in the rudest of surroundings, the record in this case demonstrates that deficient facilities are conducive to a deficient education. Thorough and efficient means more than teaching the skills needed to compete in the labor market, as critically important as that may be. It means being able to fulfill one's role as a citizen, a role that encompasses far more than merely registering to vote. It means the ability to participate fully in society, in the life of one's community, the ability to appreciate music, art, and literature, and the ability to share all of that with friends. As plaintiffs point out in so many ways, and tellingly, if these courses are not integral to a thorough and efficient education, why do the richer districts invariably offer them? The disparity is dramatic. Alongside these basic-skills districts are school systems offering the broadest range of courses, instruction in numerous languages, sophisticated mathematics, arts, and sciences at a high level, fully equipped laboratories, hands-on computer experience, everything parents seriously concerned for their children's future would want, and everything a child needs. In these richer districts, most of which have some disadvantaged students, one will also find the kind of special attention and educational help so badly needed in poorer urban districts that offer only basic-skills training. If absolute equality were the constitutional mandate, and basic skills sufficient to achieve that mandate, there would be little short of a revolution in the suburban districts when parents learned that basic skills is what their children were entitled to, limited to, and no more. The State contends that the education currently offered in these poorer urban districts is tailored to the students' present need, that these students simply cannot now benefit from the kind of vastly superior course offerings found in the richer districts. No one claims here, however, that students unable to attain a level of reading, writing, or expression even approaching the expectations of their grade, pupils who, according to plaintiffs, are two years behind others on the first day they enter school, would be able to take full advantage of the richness of course offerings found in the wealthier suburbs. The State's conclusion is that basic skills are what they need first, intensive training in basic skills. We note, however, that these poorer districts offer curricula denuded not only of advanced academic courses but of virtually every subject that ties a child, particularly a child with academic problems, to school  of art, music, drama, athletics, even, to a very substantial degree, of science and social studies. [29] The result violates not only our sense of what constitutes a thorough and efficient education, but the statute as well, which requires [a] breadth of program offerings designed to develop the individual talents and abilities of students. N.J.S.A. 18A:7-5d. However articulated, such a requirement must encompass more than instruction ... in the basic communications and computational skills, which the statute cites as another major element in education. N.J.S.A. 18A:7-5c. In saying this we disparage neither these districts' decision to focus on remedial training, nor the State testing requirements that may have prompted this focus. But constitutionally, these districts should not be limited to such choices. However desperately a child may need remediation in basic skills, he or she also needs at least a modicum of variety and a chance to excel. [30] Equally, if not more important, the State's argument ignores the substantial number of children in these districts, from the average to the gifted, who can benefit from more advanced academic offerings. Since little else is available in these districts, they too are limited to basic skills. The level of substantive education is proven by plaintiffs through other indicators. Plaintiffs have selected what are sometimes regarded as strong indicators of educational quality, and have measured them among districts. Teacher ratios (the number of teachers per 1,000 pupils), the average experience of instructional staff, their average level of education, [31] all have been documented in chart after chart. As to each one of these indicators, the poorer urban districts suffer by comparison to the rich. Indeed, although the incremental showing is far from dramatic, teacher ratios, experience, and education consistently improve as the districts' property wealth, per pupil expenditure, socioeconomic status or other similar factor improves. For instance, when districts are ranked by socioeconomic status (SES), the percentage of teachers with advanced degrees rises from 29% in the lower SES districts to 52% in the higher; teachers' average experience rises from 12 years in the lower SES districts to 15 years in the higher; and the ratio of teachers to pupils rises from 61 to 68 teachers per 1,000 students. [32] There are exceptions, numerous when considered alone, but not significant enough to rebut the truth of the generality. Here we deal only with disparity  we do not find that one instructor per fifteen students, twenty students, or thirty students is necessary for a thorough and efficient education. Nor do the experts even agree on the significance of the quantity of staff, the experience of staff, or the staffs' educational background. We are satisfied, however, that these indicators support the conclusion that the absolute quality of education in the poorer urban districts is deficient. The relationship between poverty and these indicators of the quality of education has been shown. In view of that relationship, other conclusions concerning educational quality emerge. The costs of changing teacher ratios, increasing average teacher experience, teachers' educational background and, of course, increasing average staff salary, are staggering. For instance, a large urban district with 8,000 pupils and a staff ratio of one teacher per thirty pupils would have to budget an extra $980,500 per year to bring that ratio down to one per twenty-five (assuming the teacher salary was the statutory minimum, $18,500, N.J.S.A. 18A:29-5). Improvement of each of the other factors has a similarly high cost attached to it. We return to plaintiffs' insistent and persuasive question: if these factors are not related to the quality of education, why are the richer districts willing to spend so much for them? In summary, although the evidence of substantive educational level is insufficient to prove systemic lack of thorough and efficient, it is more than sufficient to prove the constitutional deficiency in a limited number of districts. Furthermore, the characteristics of those districts are such as to warrant the inference that education in similar districts  the twenty-nine poorer urban districts [33]  is similarly deficient, an inference buttressed by independent evidence of the level of education in those other districts  instructors' education and experience, teacher ratios, and per pupil expenditures. While we have no direct evidence that the breadth of the education offered in those wealthier suburban districts whose course offerings and other educational characteristics were placed on the record extends to other districts, again it is a fair inference that many wealthy districts have a similarly high level of education. Disparity exists, therefore, between education in these poorer urban districts and that in the affluent suburban districts; it is severe and forms an independent basis for our finding of a lack of a thorough and efficient education in these poorer urban districts  these students simply cannot possibly enter the same market or the same society as their peers educated in wealthier districts.