Mark Fitzgerald is normally very cautious before getting excited about proposed education legislation in Harrisburg.

As the Pleasant Valley School District solicitor said during a report at Thursday night’s school board meeting, “(Harrisburg) is usually where creative bills go to die.”

But the reintroduction of legislation that would change when public school districts have to pay tuition for students attending outside cyber/charter schools has Fitzgerald optimistic.

Under Senate Bill 337, introduced by Sen. Judith Schwank, a Democrat serving part of Berks County, a district that offers a cyber program equal in scope and content to the cyber charter school the student wants to attend will not be responsible for the tuition costs. Instead, tuition costs would be treated in cyber situations the same as they are when resident students attend non-district brick-and-mortar schools.

According to information pulled from the Pennsylvania Department of Education website, Pennsylvania districts pay charter schools, on average, $28,553 for each student who receives special education and $12,937 for regular education students. Approximately 20% of students enrolled in the state’s cyber charter schools receive special education, compared to just over 17% of students in school districts.

Schwank’s previous attempts at the same reform failed in 2013 and 2019, but Fitzgerald thinks things could be different this time around.

“I think it may have some more legs now because of the changes in the makeup of the House of Representatives,” he said. “There are certain forces at the executive level and the House level now that may want to see something like this passed.”

Though the legislation has yet to define what a public school district’s cyber program would need to do to “meet or exceed” the offering of a private charter school, Fitzgerald is confident Pleasant Valley could reach that standard.

“In this district in particular, our cyber program could compete and does compete with the Commonwealth Connection Academys of the world,” he said. “Hopefully this is something that has legs over the next few months.”

The bill was referred to the Senate Education Committee on Feb. 14.