STEFAN CZAPOROWSKI
WESTFIELD – Despite recent scrutiny regarding the school department’s budget, Westfield Vocational-Technical High School is set to not only use city funds but also contribute its fair share to the Westfield Public School system in the next fiscal year.
According to figures provided by school leadership, WVTHS pumped just over a million dollars into the city’s general fund as a direct result of out-of-district students attending the school, as around fifteen percent of the school’s student body last year resided outside the city.
Principal Stefan Czaporowski defended the school’s continued offering of instruction for smaller shops, based on low enrollment.
“If we close the shop that graduates four or five seniors, it would cost the city $15,000 per student to send them out-of-district, totaling between $60,000-$75,000,” Czaporowski said, without referencing which shop or shops were experiencing low enrollment.
Under Massachusetts State Law Chapter 74, on the books since 1921, cities and towns must provide vocational/technical education to any and all interested students, even if that city or town does not have a vocational-technical school within its district. According to the state Department of Education, districts do not have to receive Department approval to establish a vocational/technical program, but must gain Department approval in order to become a Chapter 74 Vocational/Technical program.
“Most communities that seek to become Chapter 74 programs do so in an effort to get a piece of the education funding from the state and federal government,” said Lauren Greene, a program coordinator for the state’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education in Malden.
According to Czaporowski, it makes more financial sense to offer instruction in a small program than to scrap the program and send students out of district for instruction.
“If a high school has a total of 20 students enrolled in a shop, to cut funding for that shop would end up costing the district around $300,000,” he said, as a program not offered by WVTHS would require the city of Westfield to send the student to a different Chapter 74 district in the region.
