So there was relatively good news at the School Board meeting tonight. With parent fundraising, further budget cuts and a renegotiated contract with staff the Board was able to pass budget that includes:
Class Size Reduction at 25:1 for grades k-3
Middle school electives
3-5 science lab
and a middle school counselor
1-5 PE will be funded at a partial level (around 50% - which would mean 1/2 time) with the hope that fundraising over the summer, notably The Taste of the Beach in August, will be able to bring it back up to a full time position.
The down side is that the renegotiated contract (which the staff has yet to vote on - but seems on board with) includes 5 furlough days.
I'll post more about this as I have time, but I wanted to just get the bullet points out.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Fixing Funding
If you've been following along with the home game, you'll know that funding California schools is a byzantine process - alright, well maybe you don't know that, but take my word for it, it is. At the moment, a lawsuit is attempting to address that issue. Here's a video interview with the Superintendent of the Santa Clara School District discussing the suit and why California schools are in so much trouble.
More state woes
So when we talk about school districts going under, here's what we're talking about.
According to this post, 16% of California's School Districts project that over the next two years they won't be able to pay their bills. It's not a pretty picture. While these districts are already in big trouble, things aren't over yet.
Here is the key phrase:
This is exactly what we're going through now. Hopefully, the work our District is doing with the budget will give us a little leg room, not just for this year, but for the future. I'm heading to the school board meeting tonight so I'll post an update on the whole thing soon. But it's going to be an uphill battle.
Here's the list of schools in trouble.
According to this post, 16% of California's School Districts project that over the next two years they won't be able to pay their bills. It's not a pretty picture. While these districts are already in big trouble, things aren't over yet.
Here is the key phrase:
The latest report was based on districts’ budget projections as of March. Since then, some districts have wrenched concessions from unions and laid off teachers to get off the list, at least for the moment. But until Gov. Schwarzenegger signs the state budget for the fiscal year that starts Thursday, districts won’t know if even their conservative revenue projections were optimistic.
This is exactly what we're going through now. Hopefully, the work our District is doing with the budget will give us a little leg room, not just for this year, but for the future. I'm heading to the school board meeting tonight so I'll post an update on the whole thing soon. But it's going to be an uphill battle.
Pointing out that K-12 schools saw budget cuts of $17 billion over the past two years, Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell said he has “grave concerns that more and more school districts will face financial crisis unless state lawmakers find solutions to the state budget crisis and provide adequate funding for our schools.”
Others agree. The districts’ next financial report, based on spending and revenue in October, will include projections for the 2012-13 fiscal year, when the picture will turn even darker, unless there is a miraculous economic turnaround.
Temporary state taxes will have run out, and districts must return to the full 180-day school year. They also will lose temporary flexibility on spending that the Legislature authorized for three years. Even if lawmakers extend “categorical” flexibility, many districts’ finances will be dire.
Here's the list of schools in trouble.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Redondo Beach
Here's a good story from the Easy Reader on Redondo Beach's budget situation. Hermosa's facing a tough situation but so is Redondo Beach, so is Manhattan so is every district in the State. If you get mad about this stuff (and you should), act locally, get mad globally - well - at least get mad on the State level.
All the rest HERE.
Parents and teachers filled the boardroom at Redondo Beach Unified School District headquarters Tuesday night in hopes of saving jobs and books. But the school board, facing a $3.6 million budget deficit, reluctantly passed a budget that includes the layoffs of 16 teachers and the elimination of a popular language arts workbook.
School board president Drew Gamet, himself a teacher, expressed deep remorse.
“You try to stay level as a leader in the community, but at the same time you are a parent, and I have a daughter going into third grade next year and this is just killing me,” Gamet said. “It is killing all of us…The kind of decisions we have to make are horrific.”
All the rest HERE.
Budget updates
I went to the School Board/Budget Committee study session yesterday afternoon and things don’t look quite as grim. Take that with a grain of salt because it’s still going to be a tough year, relatively speaking. Some additional cuts were presented along with shifting funds and a commitment to use at least 10% of the reserve fund. But a lot depends on negotiations with staff over possible furlough days (a prospect which parents are sure to weigh in on) and/or other layoffs and/or pay cuts.
One of the bigger things to come out of it was the prospect for at least some Class Size Reduction to return but the School Board still needs to prioritize a list of “Add Backs” using parent fundraising money at the June 30th meeting (full list down at the bottom.)
The numbers – notably the deficit - in my post below on the overall budget have changed slightly and some recommendations have been made to bridge the gap. The “barebones” budget fact sheet presented by Dr. Newlin to the group at yesterday’s meeting listed the deficit as $670,000.00. That would include a budget assuming class size at 30 to 1, would include Technology support, library programs (2 librarians at ¾ time in both schools) and Step and Column Increases.
With several proposed cuts and some changing/ shifting of funding sources, the deficit falls to around $303k.
The proposed additional cuts would be an Operational Worker (janitors), District Office Clerical Reduction, Accounting/ Food Service, Conferences, and Board Salaries. Those functions won’t go away, someone will still have to do them, but what they’re looking at is combining them. It should be noted that salaries for the five school board members would be eliminated entirely, which will be a savings in the amount of $8,000.00 over the year.
There was also a cut (50% reduction) to expenses related to staff and Board members attending conferences.
Of course $300k is still a sizable chunk of money to find, but things aren’t over. Notably the District is set to negotiate with the staff. In those talks, furlough days as well as additional salary cuts (which could mean positions or pay reduction) will be brought up. Also, the recommendation was made by the Board to use 10% of the $1.3 million dollar reserve fund to help bridge the gap.
Other items discussed included attempts to find savings in Special Education expenses, (UPDATE: which was brought up by a parent, not the school board) (Special Ed is a complex enough issue that it might require its own post later on), the public perception of exactly where there is money available to be cut and the efforts teachers are making to cut costs by bringing in their own supplies and making their own copies. Board members were concerned that some parents believe there is a significant amount of fat that can be trimmed when it is not the case. Energy costs was an example. Although the District is working on ways to reduce these, the total costs for energy are not in and of themselves significant enough to make a very large impact on this budget. Lottery Revenue was another issue where parents seem to believe large amounts of money exist, but last year the District only received about $144K in Lottery money.
All parties do seem hopeful and everyone seems to understand that what we’re all dealing with a problem that’s being passed along from Sacramento.
I’ll keep you posted.
List of Add Backs
(these are programs that could be added back into the budget using parent fundraising money along with the cost of adding them back.)
Kindergarten Class Size Reduction $72K
1st Grade CSR $72K
2nd Grade CSR $72K
3rd Grade CSR $72K
Elementary PE $84K
3-5 Science Lab $98K
Middle School Electives $150k
Art, Tech, Spanish, other
Counselor/ Admin Support $90K
Elementary Music $90K
Total add backs $800K
Amount Available for add backs $558,529.00
Unfunded Amount $241,471.00
(some of the EEC money is already spoken for in the budget for Library Technicians and Technology Support and the total amount is still in flux as my understanding is there are still donations coming in)
One of the bigger things to come out of it was the prospect for at least some Class Size Reduction to return but the School Board still needs to prioritize a list of “Add Backs” using parent fundraising money at the June 30th meeting (full list down at the bottom.)
The numbers – notably the deficit - in my post below on the overall budget have changed slightly and some recommendations have been made to bridge the gap. The “barebones” budget fact sheet presented by Dr. Newlin to the group at yesterday’s meeting listed the deficit as $670,000.00. That would include a budget assuming class size at 30 to 1, would include Technology support, library programs (2 librarians at ¾ time in both schools) and Step and Column Increases.
With several proposed cuts and some changing/ shifting of funding sources, the deficit falls to around $303k.
The proposed additional cuts would be an Operational Worker (janitors), District Office Clerical Reduction, Accounting/ Food Service, Conferences, and Board Salaries. Those functions won’t go away, someone will still have to do them, but what they’re looking at is combining them. It should be noted that salaries for the five school board members would be eliminated entirely, which will be a savings in the amount of $8,000.00 over the year.
There was also a cut (50% reduction) to expenses related to staff and Board members attending conferences.
Of course $300k is still a sizable chunk of money to find, but things aren’t over. Notably the District is set to negotiate with the staff. In those talks, furlough days as well as additional salary cuts (which could mean positions or pay reduction) will be brought up. Also, the recommendation was made by the Board to use 10% of the $1.3 million dollar reserve fund to help bridge the gap.
Other items discussed included attempts to find savings in Special Education expenses, (UPDATE: which was brought up by a parent, not the school board) (Special Ed is a complex enough issue that it might require its own post later on), the public perception of exactly where there is money available to be cut and the efforts teachers are making to cut costs by bringing in their own supplies and making their own copies. Board members were concerned that some parents believe there is a significant amount of fat that can be trimmed when it is not the case. Energy costs was an example. Although the District is working on ways to reduce these, the total costs for energy are not in and of themselves significant enough to make a very large impact on this budget. Lottery Revenue was another issue where parents seem to believe large amounts of money exist, but last year the District only received about $144K in Lottery money.
All parties do seem hopeful and everyone seems to understand that what we’re all dealing with a problem that’s being passed along from Sacramento.
I’ll keep you posted.
List of Add Backs
(these are programs that could be added back into the budget using parent fundraising money along with the cost of adding them back.)
Kindergarten Class Size Reduction $72K
1st Grade CSR $72K
2nd Grade CSR $72K
3rd Grade CSR $72K
Elementary PE $84K
3-5 Science Lab $98K
Middle School Electives $150k
Art, Tech, Spanish, other
Counselor/ Admin Support $90K
Elementary Music $90K
Total add backs $800K
Amount Available for add backs $558,529.00
Unfunded Amount $241,471.00
(some of the EEC money is already spoken for in the budget for Library Technicians and Technology Support and the total amount is still in flux as my understanding is there are still donations coming in)
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Here comes the sun...
One of the things the district is doing to save a little money is looking into solar panels for the schools. They're in the process of researching it, but at the last school board meeting Business Manager Angela Jones said the District's electric bills are between $6k-8k a month so if they can put in enough solar panels to meet the schools' needs that would be a significant savings.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Fantastic work
This was in the Surf Report - thought I'd repost it since it's great news.
Note: the donation form was in the PDF - I changed it to a link to the HBEF site - so click and scroll to the bottom and you'll find the form.
1 Week Left to Donate to This Year’s Excellence in Education Campaign!
Thank you to everyone who participated in the EEC Change Jar
Competition. The jars raised over $2,000 at View alone! (The Valley jar
is still being counted.) In total, the EEC has raised $608,000 for our
schools! On top of this, the HBEF and HVPTO have together raised an
additional $234,000 which brings our fundraising total to $842,000. If
you haven't already contributed to the EEC, please do so before the
campaign closes on June 30th. Donations of all sizes are welcome and
the EEC Committee encourages every family to participate at whatever
level they are able! Please donate online at www.hbef.org or print a
donor form (click here) and return it to your school office before the
end of school.
Questions: Jill Stamp | jillbstamp@verizon.net
Note: the donation form was in the PDF - I changed it to a link to the HBEF site - so click and scroll to the bottom and you'll find the form.
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