Fairfax County is going to reimburse parents for the money they had to spend on Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate tests after the Virginia attorney general ruled the fees illegal. The school system will lose at least $2 million by refunding the fees to comply with Ken Cuccinelli’s decision that “a local school board cannot impose a mandatory fee on students taking Advanced Placement courses for the required taking of the Advanced Placement Examination.”
This school year was the first that Fairfax school officials included $75 fees per AP and IB exam and a $100 sports fee to combat the recession’s effects. The county has reduced its per-student spending by about $740 to $12,597 the last two years as the school system’s budget was reduced by $52.5 million to $2.2 billion and enrollment shot up by 7,000 students.
School board member Jane Strauss said the board wanted to remove the fees even before Cuccinelli’s ruling.
“It was [implemented] because of the recession, and we believed that when times got better it was one of the first things we were going to rescind anyway,” Strauss said. “We believe this is better for the kids.”
Members of the school board worried that the fees would discourage students from taking these advanced courses, in which Fairfax tends to shine. The school district was recently named to the AP Achievement List for improving students’ performance while increasing participation on the college-level exams. Other top area districts, including Montgomery and Arlington, couldn’t attain that honor because their minority students’ performance dipped.
School board member Patty Reed said not all parents complained about the fees, “but for certain parts of the population, it created major heartburn.”
Maryland charges $87 per AP exam and $96 per each IB. Montgomery County Public Schools do not pay for students to take the exams, but help those who cannot afford them, spokesman Dana Tofig said.
Emily Slough, president of the Parent-Teacher-Student Association at Annandale High School, said the PTSA was “very concerned about the impact of these fees on our students and their families, many of whom are living at or near the poverty line. We don’t want anything to hinder a student’s academic opportunities if at all possible.”
Strauss said the school board expected to refund the fees in April, but was uncertain about the logistics. “It may cost us a little more money to give the money back,” she said.
As for filling the $2 million hole — and the money the board expects to receive from the fees next year — Strauss said, “We will obviously have to do something else.”
