AMHERST — The Amherst Regional School Committee is again coming out in opposition to a 100-student increase in enrollment at the Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School in Hadley, while at the same time endorsing the Mass Promise to Invest Coalition’s call for changing the state formula for public school funding.

In a unanimous vote on Nov. 12, the committee is asking the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and Acting Commissioner Russell Johnston to nix the request that enrollment at the K-12 school rise to 684.

The Northampton City Council has similarly introduced a resolution opposing such an increase, and some PVCICS parents have also voiced concerns directly to its board of trustees that expansion shouldn’t happen.

In a separate vote, also unanimous, the School Committee supported an initiative from the Mass Promise to Invest Coalition already supported by the Northampton City Council, the Northampton School Committee and the Greenfield School Committee. Under this appeal, if successful, the regional schools could get $2 million more annually if the Legislature changes the formula for how charter school tuition and school choice payments are calculated.

With respect to the Chinese immersion school, which recently purchased an 80,000-square-foot building on Venture Way in Hadley for expansion, adding 100 students would disproportionately impact Amherst and the regional towns, with 23% of students at the charter school coming from those communities.

Amherst representative Sarah Marshall, one of the main drafters of the resolution, said financial considerations can’t be the main focus.

“We are all well aware of the financial impact of losing students to charter to that school or any charter school,” Marshall said.

Instead, the memo cites that PVCICS has fewer than a quarter of the English language learners that Amherst does, and that the number of and low-income students and students with disabilities puts the charter school in the lower half of its peer group.

“The fact that it’s such an expensive charge to us, means that we have an interest in urging the commissioner to deny the expanded enrollment request, if we can make an argument that does not depend on the money,” Marshal said.

The charter school also has never reached its enrollment maximum and it has enrollment shortfalls in underserved groups.

Superintendent E. Xiomara Herman said she would endorse the School Committee statement, but also wants to look at what can be done to retain students, including making more programming available.

“After I endorse the statement, I also think we need to look at programming in the region, so once we send this out, we are making ourselves marketable to keeping our children and our families here,” Herman said. “I’m focused on the solution, not the problem.”

Mass Promise to Invest is asking to reimburse low- and moderate-income school districts for the sending cost of charter school tuition and school choice, Amherst representative Deb Leonard said.

“It’s our only hope,” Leonard said.

Jesus Leyva of Greenfield has been a main point person for the advocacy.

“For Amherst-Pelham Regional School District, this is one of the few things that you can advocate for at the state level that would actually bring meaningful new funding to this school district,” Leyva said.

Leyva also said there is no intent to hurt charter schools or cause angst among students and families who depend on those schools.

“We’re not trying to be anti-charter school, that’s not the goal of this,” Leyva said. “The goal is simply to look at the municipal cost impact of charter school public funding as the state has set it up, on public school districts.”

Meanwhile, while some parents at PVCICS have said the school is not living up to the educational needs of all students. At a recent trustees meeting, Principal Kathleen Wang outlined efforts the school has made in this area. Among those are offering a multi-tiered system of support; regular instruction to improve learning outcomes for those with diagnostic disabilities, with 161, or 29.75% of students, depending on that; as well as a Chinese language support program. The school has also provided state-mandated 504 Support Services to 8.87% of students.

School leaders have suggested that expanding enrollment would enable them to better meet the needs of all learners.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.