The controversy over charter school funding (“Charter bills spark funding debate,” Recorder, Oct. 6) spotlights a basic flaw with Massachusetts school aid: it assumes that adequate budgets for school districts are proportional to their enrollments.

That is not true for smaller districts. If a larger district loses some students, it might be able to consolidate classes; a smaller district may only have one class, which still needs a teacher, a room, heat, lights, etc. The aid formula reduces funding, but the district cannot reduce expenses without also reducing educational quality.

This problem figured prominently in public comment to the legislature’s Foundation Budget Review Commission back in 2015, but the commission’s recommendations did not address it. Of course, it hasn’t gone away.

If every district received the funding they needed to provide an adequate education for their students, regardless of enrollment, then funding for charter schools would not affect them. Losing a student would not mean losing money: it’s that simple. The complexity comes from failing to deal with the root cause. Until that is corrected, the problems will continue.

The recent hearing also highlighted a basic issue with charter schools: justifying them because public schools aren’t doing their jobs. Of course “families must have access to strong public school options,” but if they don’t, why is the answer to create new schools rather than fixing the existing ones? Charter schools can be justified as places of experimentation, or providers of specialized education, but not as escape hatches for the few while others are left behind in failing schools.

How about if we agree that all public schools should be adequately funded, and they should all be “strong options” for the families in their districts? Maybe we can also agree that it’s up to state education officials to ensure that happens, and to push the Legislature to provide appropriate resources if and when it doesn’t.

Resources need not always mean money — they can mean management, oversight, and mentoring; whatever is needed to turn things around. Having 100% strong, successful schools should be possible in a state that prides itself on being an education leader. Let’s do it.

Mike Naughton

Millers Falls