A new report puts the price of educating the thousands of illegal immigrant children who recently crossed into the U.S. at a whopping $761 million this school year -- as some school systems push for the feds to pick up the tab.

The estimate comes from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), which issued a report on the 37,000 "unaccompanied minors" — who mainly are from Central America — after analyzing data from the Department of Health and Human Services and education funding formulas in all 50 states.

The numbers underscore the concerns critics have raised for months about the burden the surge is putting on local school systems and governments.

"We're not doing American students any favors by dumping in tens of thousands of additional illegal alien children," FAIR's Bob Dane told Fox News.

The report breaks down the costs by state. The biggest impact reportedly will be seen in California, Texas, Florida and New York. The Empire State leads the list with a bill of more than $147 million.

PATERSON — With classes about to start, city school officials are scrambling to fill scores of vacant teaching positions, many of them for special education and students who are learning English.

As of last Wednesday, the district had 131 openings at its schools, most of them teaching jobs, said deputy superintendent Eileen Shafer. That included 38 special education jobs, 29 for English Language Learner classes, seven for math and six for science.