The Lakewood School District has received an 80% or higher score in all five areas of the New Jersey Quality Single Accountability Continuum (QSAC), the first time it has done so since 2007. The 5 areas measured are: “Instruction and Program,” “Fiscal Management,” “Governance,” “Operations,” and “Personnel.”

The QSAC is a State rating system used by the New Jersey Department of Education to keep track of the performance of individual school districts across the State.

As to Lakewood public schools, the key area which saw the most significant positive rise was that of “Instruction and Program” which rose from a 54% (“not meeting standards”) score in 2017 to 80% (“passing”) in 2020.

The School District said that it looks forward to obtaining a perfect score but noted that “we are the only urban district in Ocean County, the only 100% free and reduced lunch district in Ocean County, and have the highest percentage of students and families who are not native English speakers, many of whom come from disadvantaged countries with little or no cohesive educational system.”

Lakewood Board of Education General Counsel and spokesperson Michael Inzelbuch told TLS, “Our educational improvements are a credit to our instructional staff, support staff, supervisors, Superintendent and the Board members who are all driven to serve our consumer, the ever-growing public school population, both in-district and out of the district.”

In the category of “Fiscal Management,” to the credit of the Board, Superintendent, and the District’s Business office staff, the Lakewood School District recently filed a successful appeal that raised its QSAC score in the category to 80% (“passing”). The District is continuing with a further appeal to raise the 80% Fiscal Management score to 88%, based on documentation and data, as well as the report of an independent auditor who demonstrated the alleged arbitrary and unfair treatment of the Lakewood School District as compared to other Ocean County school districts.

In the category of “Governance,”  an area that concentrates primarily on how the elected Board of Education functions, the score jumped dramatically from 66% (“not meeting standards”) in 2017 to 100% (“perfect score”) in 2020.

Michael Inzelbuch also told TLS: “For the first time since 2006, we as a District have passed in all 5 QSAC areas. Now, the Legislature and Public can say with confidence that Lakewood is running efficiently by the State’s very own standards. The time is ripe for a Legislative fix and a Grant – not another loan – to the never-ending Ponzi scheme of Loans due to what all agree is an inapplicable State funding formula due to Lakewood’s unique, ever-growing needs and demographics.”