March 5, 2009

   A pocket guide to budget cuts

Class sizes could increase, teacher layoffs are likely and no new programs will be added next year under a proposed budget presented to the Wake County Board of Education this week by Superintendent Del Burns.

Burns said the austerity moves should be enough to avoid further cuts once legislators decide how to handle projected deficits at the state level, but he made no promises.

“This is the result of the highest level of financial uncertainty I have experienced not just as a school administrator, but in my lifetime,” Burns said. (Click here for entire address.)

By their nature, school budgets quickly become a blur of numbers. The 309-page document for 2009-2010 is no exception. But a few key figures will frame the budget discussion in the weeks ahead. Those numbers also offer a handy guide to gauge the district’s response to expected cuts:

$316.9 million: That is the amount Burns is recommending the school board request from county commissioners. It is virtually the same amount the district was scheduled to receive this year before budgets were cut in the fall. The amount requested from the county won’t cover increases in health care premiums, utility bills or any salary increases mandated by the General Assembly. That money must come from other parts of the budget. The County money pays a large share of the district’s utility costs, central office staff and some teachers. There isn’t much negotiating room in this figure as the county already knows it will be difficult to reach this level of funding.

5 percent: This is the potential cut the district is expecting from state lawmakers and it is built into the superintendent’s proposal. If the General Assembly reduces allocations to public schools by more than 5 percent, it means additional cuts would be needed.  If it cuts funding by less than 5 percent, positions would be restored. More than 60 percent of the district’s money comes from the state. The bulk of state money pays for teachers.

1,496 employees: Wake employs almost 1,500 full- and part-time employees using something called a “terminating contract.” That means those contracts technically last only one year, which was never an issue in times of growth. A majority are teaching positions. Terminating contracts are the obvious place to cut when revenue falls short.

2,300 students: Despite the recession, the district is expected to grow by roughly 2,300 students next year to 141,000 children. They need to sit somewhere.

School board members will hold numerous budget discussions during the next seven weeks before sending their formal request to county commissioners in late April.

The accompanying chart shows how the proposed 2009-2010 operating budget would be spent in North Carolina’s largest school district. It does not include any federal stimulus money because final amounts and key details about how that can be spent are still unknown. 

While an operating budget of $1.2 billion is huge by the standards of most school districts, Wake County schools’ per pupil expenditures ranked 76th out of 115 school districts in 2007-2008 – the most recent year available for statewide data.

The long view

More than 75 people gathered last week at Martin Street Baptist Church in Southeast Raleigh to talk about diversity and academic achievement in Wake County’s public schools. The gathering, organized by the Coalition of Concerned Citizens for African American Children, was held partly in response to a meeting last month in Holly Springs organized by residents opposed to the district’s reassignment policies.

Some members of that group, known as Wake Schools Community Alliance, attended the meeting at Martin Street Baptist Church at the invitation of the coalition. While the gathering was racially mixed, it was largely African-American and overwhelmingly supportive of the school system’s efforts to create a district in which all schools are socio-economically diverse. Most speakers were parents and community activists, although roughly a half dozen elected officials – including county commissioners, school board members and legislators – attended. Sen. Vernon Malone, the first chairman of the newly-merged county school board in 1976, was the featured speaker.

Malone recounted the economic and academic reasons that drove Wake County to merge its public schools into a single district in 1976 and made it clear he believes diversity – better known as integration then – is just as important today.

“I don’t apologize for what we did 30 years ago and I don’t apologize for the track Wake County Public Schools are on today,” he said. “Students must live together and study together if this community is going to be strong.”

Speakers on both sides of the issue agreed that the district must do everything possible to reduce long bus rides. But several parents pointed out that poorer families are typically assigned the longest rides, and while they do not like that fact, they are generally the strongest supporters of the district’s diversity efforts.

Noteworthy

…. More than 13,000 applications were filed for 2009-2010 magnet school programs, an increase of about 8 percent compared to last year, according to school officials. The increase was apparent in both year-round and traditional magnet options.

…..A bill that would kill North Carolina’s high school graduation project is waiting for a hearing in the House. The idea of the project has been applauded, but many local school leaders say the details were handled so poorly by the state Department of Public Instruction that it is not a meaningful program.
…. The National Governors Association last week endorsed a process to develop common academic standards by comparing student performance on international tests. While the statement does not address details of how this would be done, it’s notable because it follows similar calls by the Council of the Great City Schools, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, the American Federation of Teachers and U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.

Wake Education Partnership is a 501(c)(3) non-profit created in 1983 to support public schools, in part by educating the community on current school issues. Most of its financial support comes from local business. Send comments to Tim Simmons, VP Communications, at  tsimmons@wakeedpartnership.org