When Gov. Phil Murphy proposed his $48.9 billion state budget in March, he called the plan “rooted in a renewed commitment to moving our state forward, creating opportunity for every family.”
Seventeen-year-old Katrina Frey of Wildwood Catholic Academy would like “opportunity” to include more funds for her busing needs.
Since the third grade, Frey has been making the 12-mile journey from her Cape May home to the Wildwood campus. At the beginning of this year, however, the school district reduced the number of buses. Since then, Frey said, it has been a hectic time for her family to get to and from school.
“I have to borrow my father’s car, and drive my sister [seventh-grader, Rebecca] and I to school in the morning, or one of my parents will drive us,” she explains.
Because both of her parents work, the juggling schedules lead to inconsistency. Engaged in her favorite subject, math, and myriad activities such as golf, tennis, theater and mock trial, she likes “having a set schedule, and due [to the budget issues], I’m not able to do that.”
By taking the bus to school, “I could do schoolwork while going home, and my family and I could save gas money,” she said.
For the past two months, nonpublic school advocates have been contacting their state legislators to urge an increase in transportation funding from $1,000 to at least $1,150 per student. Using the New Jersey Catholic Conference’s Voter Voice platform, 1,932 people from the state’s five (arch)dioceses made their voices heard before New Jersey’s governor unveils the Fiscal Year 2023 state budget in July. Of that number, 1,023 were from the Diocese of Camden.
In these last weeks of June, Catholic school administrators stress that there is still time to contact state lawmakers by finding their representatives at njleg.state.nj.us/legislative-roster.
If everyone “would take five minutes to express their concerns, New Jersey’s leaders would have to pay attention,” said Sister Rose DiFluri, assistant superintendent of Catholic schools in the Diocese of Camden.
When it comes to nonpublic school busing, tightening budgets, rising fuel prices and the financial ripple effects of the COVID pandemic have created limited options for students, the NJCC, the public policy arm of the state’s Catholic bishops, has reported. Instead of being offered transportation, nonpublic school student parents are instead receiving aid-in-lieu payments. This is the first time since the inception of nonpublic school transportation in 1968 that the number of students given aid-in-lieu payments exceeded the number transported.
For most parents, aid-in-lieu does not help in getting their children to and from a nonpublic school because many parents have no alternative other than busing. The NJCC notes that parents are at the mercy of private bus contractors, who provide more than 85 percent of nonpublic transportation.
Principal Joe Cray said nonpublic transportation has affected recruitment – and retention – at Wildwood Catholic Academy.
“We’ve lost students because of busing [problems], when they couldn’t find alternate means,” he explained, adding that for prospective families, “Sometimes it’s their first question; it steers them away from even considering [enrolling.]”
Calling the problems devastating for families, Cray said the lack of busing is also an added stress for students because it cuts into their own personal time.
For example, he said the bus commute for Vineland/Millville students can be an hour and half, while the Middle Township bus can take 45 minutes to an hour to arrive on campus.
Time is something Dr. Elizabeth Cerceo’s family juggles every day. She knows “each parent is doing their own individual calculus” on the transportation realities. She and her husband live in the Erlton section of Cherry Hill, where there is no busing to her children’s school – Resurrection Catholic School.
“It’s been a bit of a patchwork” getting her four children – grades pre-K to five – to the Cherry Hill school, she said, explaining the scramble of coordinating neighbors and babysitters for pick-ups and drop-offs.
On the mornings she is able to drive her family to school, she has to build in an extra 30 minutes to get to work on time. A bus, she said, “would streamline our mornings.”
At nearby Paul VI High School in Haddonfield, President Michael Chambers said “it’s an extremely complex situation” all around, as bus companies realize that with the state allotting only $1,000 for each nonpublic school student, it can be cost-prohibitive to accommodate them. Thus, there is a critical need for “families to make their voices heard with state legislators to treat Catholic students fairly,” and let local leaders know that children have every right to be transported to schools – whether public or nonpublic.
In addition, he noted that for students in designated “walking districts,” with no bus transportation for public and private students alike, families do not receive the aid-in-lieu at all, even if they go outside the district for Catholic schools, like Paul VI’s students.
Two district buses from Washington Township and Pennsauken, and six privately run covering Camden, Gloucester and Burlington Counties transport 975 students to the Haddonfield school. It’s a long ride for some of these students, Chambers noted, as some board buses at 6:15 a.m. and don’t arrive to their lockers until 90 minutes later.
Sleep, homework and stability are all affected by this transportation issue, he said, which is why he is hopeful supporters of Catholic education will contact state legislators to increase funding. “Our Catholic school voices are powerful.”
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