School Administration Tightens Budget

The Board of Education and the district administration are touting a 2010-2011 budget that would increase spending by a mere 1.39 percent over the current fiscal year—the lowest year-on-year increase going back at least nine years. That feat would be achieved by reducing staff, cutting one bus, trimming printing and postage costs, and taking advantage of energy efficiencies. The board is expected to approve the budget next week.

Under the contract settled back in October, teachers agreed to take on more outside-the-classroom duties, allowing eight full-time teaching assistant jobs, worth $200,000, to be eliminated. As enrollment shrinks slightly, one elementary homeroom teacher would also be cut, while keeping class sizes within district guidelines. And the district also plans to cut back on substitutes by about 3 percent.

It would be the second year in a row that overall staffing levels are cut, but there would be a net increase in the number of certified faculty members.

"We're replacing teacher's aides with teachers... for the same cost," explained Board of Education Chairman Nick Williams. 
 
One core subject section would be added to each grade in the high school, along with one elective subject section, equivalent to 1.2 full-time faculty members. Two full-time teachers would also be added to accommodate the continued phase-in of the Foreign Language in the Elementary Schools (FLES) program.

Another high school guidance counselor would be hired in response to a call from the board to bring the student-counselor ratio more in line with the other schools in the district reference group. The district is also looking to bring a part-time library aide up to full-time and add a full-time technology aide at Saxe Middle School.

The result is that, in a year in which faculty and staff are getting a 2 percent raise, total salary costs would go up just 1.8 percent, or $28,100. Concessions in the union contract are expected to keep benefit costs basically flat.

Taking one school bus off the road amounts to $72,000 in savings. That cut would bring the fleet down to 33 from 37 buses in the 2004-2005 academic year while total enrollment has only gone down by 30 students.

"I think that's a testament to the work that our transportation manger has done," Williams said, noting Roy Walder's use of software to refine routes and his outreach to parents to clarify bus stops and walk-to-school policies. 

The district is hoping to save $10,000 by increasing e-mail communication and decreasing mailings. At the same time the administration wants to reinstate about $74,000 so that faculty can attend professional conferences—that line was zeroed out in the previous budget cycle.

"We feel the administration has heard what the board's direction was—to look under every rock to find as many as efficiencies as we can," board Budget Committee Chair Kathy Smith told Superintendent David Abbey after the conclusion of his budget presentation Monday.

A few components of the budget are still up in the air.

The board asked Abbey and k-8 World Language Coordinator Lizette D'Amico to look into what it would take to accelerate the phase-in of FLES so that Spanish would be taught in grade 5 during the upcoming academic year. Abbey said that would cost about $92,000 and put the district back on track with the original roll-out plan which included a pilot 5th grade program starting this year that was put on hold due to budget constraints.

Williams said the board's interest in extending FLES to the 5th grade sooner comes from parent input. "If you're going to [teach Spanish in] 1, 2, 3, 4, and you've got it and Saxe, and you've got it in the high school, you're leaving that 5th grade on an island," he said.

The board also has yet to finalize the prioritization of its capital projects list and decide whether to include the purchase of a $367,500 data warehouse to replace the out-dated existing system used for analysis of student performance.