Non-resident student application
After a two-year moratorium, Broadalbin-Perth is now accepting applications from non-resident families interested in enrolling their children in B-P schools for the 2019-20 school year. The deadline to submit the application is Aug. 15.
During the July 15 Board of Education meeting, Superintendent of Schools Stephen Tomlinson introduced a new application that families will have to complete. He explained that all applications are subject to his approval in accordance with guidelines from the New York State Education Department, as well as existing district resources.
“If admitting the non-resident student would require us to hire additional personnel or expend district resources on programs or services that we don’t already provide for our resident students, I won’t be approving the non-resident student’s application,” Tomlinson said.
For this reason, B-P is not accepting non-resident student applications for its full-day prekindergarten program for 4-year-olds; the program is already at capacity for the 2019-20 school year.
Tomlinson added that application approval will be for the 2019-20 school year only; families of non-resident students will have to submit an application every year they want their child to be enrolled in Broadalbin-Perth schools. Non-resident student applicants must be in good academic and disciplinary standing at their current school, and families are responsible for transportation to and from B-P schools.
Tomlinson also said that, depending on current class sizes and other factors, a family’s application for one child might be approved while a sibling’s application is denied.
“We might be at the low end of our class size range in third grade, for example, but be maxed out in fifth grade,” Tomlinson explained. “In that scenario, accepting an additional fifth-grade student would require us to hire additional personnel, so that student’s application would be rejected.”
Tomlinson said the district requires a minimum of two weeks to review non-resident student applications before notifying families of decisions. If a student’s application is approved, the family must pay a minimum of 50% of the annual tuition cost up-front before going through the district’s regular registration process. Tuition for newly enrolled students is $7,000 for the school year; tuition for returning students is $4,410.