BY DAN HILDEBRAN
Union County Schools Superintendent Mike Ripplinger suggested that $500 is “the sweet spot” for charging the parents of homeschoolers who participate in Union County School District Sports.
Ripplinger added that some school districts are charging double that amount for homeschoolers playing football, volleyball, and other interscholastic sports.
The superintendent made those comments while briefing school board members on his meetings with other state education leaders about how districts are responding to Florida’s Personalized Education program, popularly known as PEP, which is prompting an exodus of public-school students throughout Florida.
Rippplinger said he is formulating a plan for charging homeschooling parents for their students joining Union County School District activities, clubs, and sports.
He added that homeschooled students in the state’s Personalized Education Program would not pay the district out-of-pocket for such activities.
Instead, the district would be listed as a vendor on a state internet portal, and parents wanting to send their students to a Union County School District activity would indicate that choice on the portal. The state would then allocate part of that student’s annual $8,500 PEP scholarship to the district.
Traditional homeschooling parents, however, who do not participate in PEP, would be required to pay out of pocket and would not be reimbursed.
The superintendent told board members during a July 8 workshop that the pay schemes vary widely from district to district, including the prices for sports.
“There were districts that just charged a thousand dollars no matter what,” he told school board members. “If you played this sport, it was a thousand dollars. If you played another sport, it was (another) thousand dollars.”
Ripplinger also said classes at Union County public schools would be available to homeschooled students, adding the Florida Virtual School charges $375 for a virtual course, and the Union school district would likely charge a similar fee for virtual classes.
For brick-and-mortar classes, Ripplinger said he was favoring a price based on full-time equivalents, which for the coming year is a little over $9,100 per student.
“So, when you break that down,” he said, “when you think of FTE or full-time equivalent, think of a pie with six different slices or so (for six class periods throughout the school day). So, if you divide that ($9,100) by six and then divide that by half because…the courses are done by semester, it would be $775 per course per semester, which again is a reimbursable expense for the parent.”
Ripplinger said that when looking at interscholastic sports, like football, basketball, and volleyball, his interest is in recovering the district’s cost of coaches’ supplements and other expenses, like equipment and uniforms.
The superintendent said he was leaning toward a $100 fee for clubs, like FFA or Beta Club.
Ripplinger told board members his work on the pricing plan is 90% to 95% complete, and he would be asking the board to approve the plan during its last meeting in July.
