The number of low-income students attending private schools in Milwaukee using publicly funded vouchers dropped sharply between September and January, according to figures released Thursday the state Department of Public Instruction.

The decline of almost 1,500 students meant that the number of voucher students is more than 1,000 students below the cap that had been set state law for this year, although the total in September was about 200 above the cap. In any case, the issue is academic now because a state law, passed a month ago, raised the cap.

DPI said that 14,217 students at 122 schools were using vouchers as of the official attendance day in January, compared with 15,700 at 125 schools in September. The decline reflected three factors:

-- DPI closed three voucher schools during the first semester, using state laws setting minimum educational standards for a private school and regulating financial operation of voucher schools. The three -- Northside High School, L.E.A.D.E.R. Institute and Tucker's Institute of Learning -- listed 515 voucher students in September.

-- Because the number of voucher students had hit the limit in September, DPI ordered that no students could be added to the voucher list for January. That meant any time such students left a school, they were not replaced with a different student getting voucher money, as would have been the case in prior years.

-- There generally has been a decrease in voucher numbers from September to January, a reflection of high turnover in some of the schools and perhaps of a net out-flow of students from private schools to public schools in the course of a school year.

The official voucher count for cap purposes is based not on the simple number of students but on "full-time equivalent" students. That is a lower number since 4-year-old kindergartners are counted as a fraction of a regular student for funding purposes. The full-time equivalent count was 13,652.8 in January, down from 15,091.3 in September. Those numbers compared with a cap for this year of 14,848.

Under the new law, the cap for the program is a flat 22,500; under the old law, it was 15% of the enrollment in Milwaukee Public Schools, which meant the number had been gradually declining in recent years to below 15,000.

State officials previously estimated that voucher payments would total $93 million this year. They now estimate it will be $91 million. Private schools are paid up to $6,351 for each qualifying student under the voucher program this year.

DPI challenges academy

State regulators have asked Woodson Academy, a school that has been in the voucher program for a decade, to document that it meets the minimum requirements of a private school under state law, according to a letter obtained Thursday the Journal Sentinel.

The letter asks Dennis Alexander, the head of the school, to document that the school is providing 875 hours of instruction this year, the minimum required law.

The letter could lead to a determination that the school should be dropped from the voucher program. Alexander was given until today to respond.

Woodson reported to the state that it had 159 students on vouchers in September and 108 in January. Now in a former Milwaukee Public Schools elementary school at 2215 N. 4th St., Woodson has had voucher enrollment as high as 290 in previous years.

Alexander could not be reached for comment late Friday, but in a recent interview, he complained that DPI was making it very difficult for the school to operate. He said officials had withheld $263,000 from the school because of challenges to whether applications for vouchers were valid. He said he felt DPI was doing things to some voucher schools solely aimed at hurting those schools.

The DPI report on school-by-school voucher enrollment can be found on the Internet going to dpi.wi.gov/sms/choice.html and clicking on "Number of Choice Students Enrolled School, 2005-06."