Camden City School District announces cuts to close $91M budget hole

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Facing a $91 million budget gap, Camden City School District will be reducing staff, consolidating leadership at the Camden High School campus and changing the academic structure at one school to close the shortfall.

State District Superintendent Katrina McCombs announced the moves Wednesday, which were first reported by The Philadelphia Inquirer. She cited declining enrollment and rising charter and renaissance school costs as factors for the short fall.

“We are implementing a series of very, very difficult cuts, but necessary steps in order to stabilize our finances and preserve what matters … the experiences of our students that they have in our classrooms,” she said.

Declining enrollment, increased payments to charter and renaissance schools factors in budget shortfall

According to the school district, enrollment fell from 11,660 students when the New Jersey Department of Education took over in the 2013-2014 school year to 5,904 students in the 2023-24 school year, a nearly 50% drop. For the same period, payments to charter and renaissance schools have grown from $54.9 million to $198.6 million.

The cuts come despite the district benefitting the most from state funding among all districts in South Jersey. In his budget proposal, Gov. Phil Murphy wants to send $369.7 million to the Camden City School District for next year, a near $21 million bump when compared to the 2025 budget year. The proposed allocation also places Camden among districts across the state receiving the most in K-12 state aid.

“How are we in a deficit while under state monitoring and state control?” posed Ronsha A. Dickerson, a Camden resident and executive director of the Camden Parent and Student Union.

“Why is it that the [school district] can find the money to pay for a sexual assault case but cannot manage state funds to secure our children’s education?” she added, referring to the $2 million settlement the district paid after a jury found it and Wasim Muhammad were responsible for creating “a sexually hostile educational environment” three decades ago.

Muhammad was a teacher at the time the acts took place. He would later become president of the school advisory board and resigned last year after continued community pressure.

Dickerson adds residents and students are “humiliated” by the deficit and that “the emotional impact that the New Jersey Education Department, Superintendent McCombs [Camden Mayor Vic] Carstarphen and local elected leaders have put on public education in Camden, New Jersey is nauseating.”

McCombs, when asked how the state-operated district amassed a large deficit, said the deficit did not result from mismanagement, adding that the structural deficit predated her becoming leader of Camden schools in 2018, to when renaissance schools were created.

“We have done everything possible within our control to manage every dime that we have efficiently, and this is where we’re left,” she said.

In addition, she said the district made the state aware it faced a $51 million for the current school year.

“We were advised to utilize our funds,” she said. “We utilize our [American Rescue Plan and Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief] funds in allowable ways in order to close that shortfall.”

Dr. Keith Benson Jr., a teacher at Camden High School and former president of the Camden Education Association, doesn’t doubt the curtailment in government grant money, but “to the tune of $91 million? No way on God’s green earth.”

He also foresees another issue to affect the number of students who attend Camden district schools, its enrollment process. Benson has been a longtime critic of the One Camden enrollment system.

“They have the ability to cap enrollment,” he said. “So, it looks like parents are choosing other places to go to school.”

Across the board cuts and a school closing to save more than $23.8 million

Cuts detailed by McCombs are across the board. The positions impacted include 20 teachers, along with attendance officers, behavior specialists, clerks, custodians, deans, family and operations coordinators, lead educators, managers, nurses, principals and security officers.

In all, staff reductions will total 289, including 117 people who are being released, 38 people who are being reassigned and 97 vacancies that are being eliminated. The district expects to save $23.8 million in the personnel moves and restructuring.

Structures to be changed at Camden High and Morgan Village Middle School

The district also announced changes to the leadership at the Camden High School Campus, the site of four high schools. The number of principals at the school will be reduced from four to one, with four “lead educators” or vice principals. Currently, there are five “lead educators.”

Morgan Village Middle School, currently a stand-alone school for grades 6-8, will turn into an alternative school for students in the Star Academy program. Middle school students would be sent to their neighborhood family schools.

McCombs, a product of the school district and whose mom worked as a paraprofessional at then-Woodrow Wilson High School, called the changes “deeply personal” and “have not been made lightly.”

“Every member of our team plays an important role in supporting each and every one of our students,” she said. “Still the path forward requires that we align our resources with the size and needs of our district today, not the size of the district we were a decade ago.”