A test for Murphy: An army of children are falling into the digital divide | Moran – NJ.com

Sen. Teresa Ruiz wore a mask at Thursday’s hearing in Trenton, but her fury came through loud and clear.

She was alarmed that at last count, 230,000 poor kids in New Jersey lacked the computers and internet connection they need to get an education during this pandemic, damning them to fall even further behind their wealthier peers. Six months after the virus shut down the schools, the digital divide remains a chasm, and an army of New Jersey children are stuck on the wrong side.

“We are ultimately engaging in the process of filtering kids towards failure,” said Ruiz, a Democrat from Newark and chair of the Education Committee. “It should be our responsibility to ensure that kids have what they need to learn…I’ve been expressing frustration about this since March.”

No one, including the Department of Education, knows exactly how many kids remain without connection. The 230,000 was based on income data and surveys of parents during the pandemic, but no one considers that reliable. “It’s an estimate,” says Mike Yaple, a spokesman for the department of Education.

That, too, drives Ruiz to distraction. How can we solve a problem if we can’t measure it?

“We estimated 230,000 based on numbers of free and reduced lunch,” she says. “But I really have no idea how many it is, and that’s the point. I’ve told them this 100 times.”

Educators across the state are scrambling to find answers, and some districts are scrambling better than others. Money is not the core problem, they say, thanks to federal aid.

But many homes in New Jersey’s poor cities lack internet connections, even hot spots. And with schools across the country fiercely competing for computer hardware, supply lines are strained to the snapping point.

Paterson ordered nearly 14,000 Chromebooks in June, but the deal fell through in August when a firm involved in the deal was sanctioned by the U.S. government as part of its confrontation with China. The district managed to find a substitute just before classes began.

“My technology folks worked extremely hard and went after every company possible,” says Superintendent Eileen Shafer. “We had to take about 6,000 older devices and refurbish them as well. Everyone has a device now.”

But in Irvington, bordering Newark, the 1,000 Chromebooks the district ordered in February has still not arrived. “I’m turning over every possible stone,” says Superintendent April Vauss. “But we’re still waiting. We’re up against immense demand around the country.”

Securing internet connections is an even bigger challenge, many districts say. In New Jersey’s older cities, many apartments buildings are still not wired, and up to a third of all homes do not have internet connections. Also, given the high poverty, and the surge in job losses, many families who have internet service are struggling to pay the monthly bill. In effect, free public education in New Jersey isn’t quite so free anymore.

“This is now an essential resource that the state has to guarantee as part of its Constitutional obligation to prove every kid with a thorough and efficient education,” says David Sciarra, head of the Education Law Center, which advocates for poor students.

“You can’t just pass the buck to local districts and let them figure it out, or leave it to philanthropy, or let it depend on whether a family can afford to pay their cable bill. This is essential and the state has to make sure it’s available to every child in every district.”

That phrase in the state Constitution — “thorough and efficient” — is the club that Sciarra has used to beat the state over the head for the last 20 years in court, wining nearly every time. His signal to Gov. Phil Murphy is not a subtle one.

Sciarra wants the state to establish a database showing where kids lack access to virtual instruction, down to the school. He wants the state to coordinate purchases of hardware to gain bargaining power and ensure supply lines. He wants the state Board of Public Utilities to press for concessions from internet providers to ensure low-cost access.

To Sciarra, Murphy is punting this problem to local districts in the same way President Trump punted the virus problem to states. “It’s the same passing the buck,” Sciarra says. “The state is saying to local district, ‘You figure this out.’”

I spoke to the senior team at the Department of Education, now led by Kevin Dehmer, who became interim commissioner in July after Commissioner Lamont Repollet stepped down to become president of Kean University.

They know they have a problem and are working non-stop to fix it, sending waves of federal money to districts to help them cope. But they are stuck in a familiar box: While the Constitution pins responsibility on the state government to provide a good education to each child, the bodies are in the local districts. Most observers say the department itself is so depleted that it lacks the capacity to effectively respond. It can set rules, and review compliance, but it has no reserve army to send to the districts and answer a crisis of this magnitude.

“It’s always been low-functioning,” Sciarra says of the Department of Education. “That’s been true in my 20 years of experience, and it’s worse now. In some sense, the years of neglect have come home to roost at the very worst time.”

School has opened in most districts, so kids without connections are falling behind. In the end, it’s up to Murphy to limit the damage.

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Tom Moran may be reached at tmoran@starledger.com. Follow him on Twitter @tomamoran. Find NJ.com Opinion on Facebook.