District Budget Info
I forgot but an alert reader, Janne, reminded me that the district has a budget office page with good information and a link to each school's allocation. Here's the link. Here's another link to the Business Operations which lays out what each department does in the district. I went to their "Goals" section and was reminded of another cost that the district is bearing this year:
Our department of technology services provides several important services, including student assignment, student information, and academic systems data. Many of these services – including student assignment – operate on a 1970’s era VAX computer system, which must be replaced. Migration off of the VAX system to a new technology platform is currently in progress. The new platform is on track to be implemented in preparation for the adoption of our new student assignment plan which is expected to take effect in fall 2010.
As I recall, Tracy Libros had explained that they were going to run the enrollment on both the VAX and the new platform to make sure the new platform works (and the VAX is the back-up). Clearly, there's a cost to that but how much it is, I don't know but we're paying for it. Is that bad? Maybe not but it seems everywhere you look, money just drifts away.
I hear a lot of pain in the words of parents who have written here and at Harium's blog about going to their school's budget meeting and seeing the reality of what their child's school is facing. It really hits home. What this points out (and I think the district sometimes loses sight of) is that every single dollar counts. When I get whiny about the BEX or the BTA, please understand that I get that not every single dollar can always be directly going to a school. But we need more of those capital dollars AND the Operating budget dollars to get used the best way. Here were some of my suggestions about cutting back that I suggested to Harium at his blog on the budget thread:
Cut the coaches. (Yes, I know that doesn't mean they all lose their jobs but really, put them back into the classrooms and at least save the gas of them running around town. I was told that the coaches don't stay in one zone but have schools in all directions. Why?)
Cut some of the 28 FTE in BEX that even the head of BEX questioned at a BEX Oversight Committee meeting. (Those positions aren't even counting the project managers for each BEX project.)
Cut the two Broad residents who are at the end of their two-year residency at SPS. They cost us $45K plus benefits (with Broad paying the other $45K of their salary). If we keep them on, that's $90k more a year right there. Also, Carol Rava Treat's $100K+ salary is being paid this year by the Broad Foundation. What about next year?
No travel for SPS employees except the Board, the Superintendent, the COO and CAO for the next year.
Do what the judge in the math adoption case says, review the math adoption, and save the money on appealing it. Seriously, Harium said they weren't going to do the total review of all the textbooks, just the Discovery series. Do what the judge wants and move on.
Each and everyone of us knows about how things add up. Well, these things in the district do as well.
Our department of technology services provides several important services, including student assignment, student information, and academic systems data. Many of these services – including student assignment – operate on a 1970’s era VAX computer system, which must be replaced. Migration off of the VAX system to a new technology platform is currently in progress. The new platform is on track to be implemented in preparation for the adoption of our new student assignment plan which is expected to take effect in fall 2010.
As I recall, Tracy Libros had explained that they were going to run the enrollment on both the VAX and the new platform to make sure the new platform works (and the VAX is the back-up). Clearly, there's a cost to that but how much it is, I don't know but we're paying for it. Is that bad? Maybe not but it seems everywhere you look, money just drifts away.
I hear a lot of pain in the words of parents who have written here and at Harium's blog about going to their school's budget meeting and seeing the reality of what their child's school is facing. It really hits home. What this points out (and I think the district sometimes loses sight of) is that every single dollar counts. When I get whiny about the BEX or the BTA, please understand that I get that not every single dollar can always be directly going to a school. But we need more of those capital dollars AND the Operating budget dollars to get used the best way. Here were some of my suggestions about cutting back that I suggested to Harium at his blog on the budget thread:
Cut the coaches. (Yes, I know that doesn't mean they all lose their jobs but really, put them back into the classrooms and at least save the gas of them running around town. I was told that the coaches don't stay in one zone but have schools in all directions. Why?)
Cut some of the 28 FTE in BEX that even the head of BEX questioned at a BEX Oversight Committee meeting. (Those positions aren't even counting the project managers for each BEX project.)
Cut the two Broad residents who are at the end of their two-year residency at SPS. They cost us $45K plus benefits (with Broad paying the other $45K of their salary). If we keep them on, that's $90k more a year right there. Also, Carol Rava Treat's $100K+ salary is being paid this year by the Broad Foundation. What about next year?
No travel for SPS employees except the Board, the Superintendent, the COO and CAO for the next year.
Do what the judge in the math adoption case says, review the math adoption, and save the money on appealing it. Seriously, Harium said they weren't going to do the total review of all the textbooks, just the Discovery series. Do what the judge wants and move on.
Each and everyone of us knows about how things add up. Well, these things in the district do as well.
Comments
Check out this letter published by the Times, written by Lowell Mom Janet Pelz. It's really heartfelt.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2011299884_guest10pelz.html
Um, so this'll probably win me no friends, but I think this Janet Pelz letter is over the top...
...I'm not saying I'm happy with the cuts. I'm just saying have a little perspective.
We need to make sure that we aren't limited to false choices offered by those framing the debate.
It may be that we need to choose between art/music/library, but let's be sure that everything is on the table not just things that directly impact kids and schools. We need to be sure that the budget cuts are framed in terms of:
art vs.district coaches,
music vs. BEX FTEs,
librarians vs. district travel expenses,
recess monitors vs. Broad residents,
counselors vs. legal appeals (math)
Just because they say we have to choose between art/music/library, doesn't mean there aren't places to trim some real fat
Why are we taking on new things that cost money when we're broke?
*MAP (I think I read 4 million on this)
*Text adoption: HS level - four titles x four grades x...150 books x...$10 = $24,000 x 9 HS = 225,000
(just for HS - that's 1/3 of a cert per school)
*STEM
Just those three things cost about what 100 1.0 FTE certs cost.
Queen Anne doesn't need ALL of the work done to reopen at $8M. That is all of the money that is listed in the facilities' report including all back logged maintenance. Not necessary.
And about the Broad, one school district has called the Broad paying folks in their school district a conflict of interest.
Check it out:
Detroit School Board Claims Conflict Of Interest In New Contract
http://www.avvo.com/news/detroit-school-board-claims-conflict-of-interest-in-new-contract-733.html
I guess that board didn't get the likes of a Payzant (Broad trained facilitator) at their board retreats.
We lost our career counselor at Nova last year. She was a huge help in getting our students into colleges. And she was only part time. The money that Melissa is referring to could make a much larger impact if spent in ways that directly affect our students and not just lost in the bureaucracy we refer to as the Stanford Center.
“The Broad Effect”: Part One
http://thebroadreport.blogspot.com/2010/03/broad-effect-part-one.html
For Seattle, I agree with Melissa that this year most of the coaching positions should go. Take some of those positions and turn them into Special Ed support. The rollout has been bad. Really bad. There are no resources to help classroom teachers. Take the rest of the coach cuts as cost savings.
I think vice principal jobs should get a hard look. Know an ineffective VP at your school? Welcome to the club. Get a lower-paid person to handle the same administrative functions, or share 1 better-paid, more effective VP between 2 schools.
IT needs a thorough review downtown. A look at all consultants on contract would be useful.
Move the counselor funding to the city via its Youth and family Initiative and reinstate Elementary Counselors. At the high school level, provide college career counseling out of the downtown headquarters. There's room. Have them work evening shifts and guarantee access (3 appts. minimum) to every HS student. Get grant and city money to fund this, too. Leave oversight in the hands of the city which does health and human services a lot better than the District does.
Allow schools who can raise the funds to supplement their librarians to return them to full day positions. For schools who cannot raise the funds, turn loose an admin person at HQ to start tracking down grants. Kids, esp. those facing language, social and economic issues at home, need access to a library.
Cut all travel, and I do mean ALL travel, except CAO and Super, as mentioned by Melissa. Webinars, people. Webinars.
Take the attendance role at elementary schools and get rid of it. Combine it w/ another admin position and pay that person overtime if necessary to handle the workload.
Have someone audit the admin support staff at headquarters and get rid of any positions lurking in there, except perhaps a shared resource in the C-suite.
Cut positions in BTA/BEX. At least 20. Delay all new capital projects, minus earthquake retrofitting and opening new schools, by one year. Drop the lowest priority projects off the list of new projects. Take ½ that money and put it into the most urgent maintenance projects in the coming year.
Audit the district communications staff and make cuts. Pay fewer people more dollars to handle more work in the department. This will upgrade the level of talent in the department and save on job benefits costs. Take one of the many project managers in communications and dedicate the position solely to identifying and implementing marketing initiatives to draw local students back into schools. With more students come more state dollars.
Finally, and this is snarky, but I am so tired of it that I cannot help myself. Walk into the HQ building at 5 minutes to 5 so that you can get in the front door. Notice how many workers are still there when the clock hits 5. It is a ghost town. I am not talking about the highest-ranking employees. They have multiple evening meetings, projects that keep them working late hours, etc. But the middle tier is pathetic. If we are scraping for every dollar we can get in our individual schools, I’d like to see an efficiency expert go through the entire place with a buzz saw and start over with (notice the reoccurring theme) fewer people with more skills who are willing to work a whole lot harder for slightly better salaries. How does someone get a state audit or privately funded grant going to do this work?
They are closing half the buildings (26, I think) and six MORE are being "transformed" or "restructured" or whatever the heck they call booting ALL the staff...
It continues: Bleed public schools, accuse them "failing," close them, send the public dollars to charters, tutoring, "curriculum design" and otehr companies....
Restaff with cheaper warm bodies en masse.
Watch education become mere bubbles on a sheet.
Teaching is dead.
Now, I know that coaches are people with families and probably very nice human beings, and no one wants to see other people lose their jobs. But I do think that if coaching positions are eliminated, we are going to lose wonderful classroom teachers and replace them with people who don't want to be there but just want to keep a job, any job, in this economy. It makes me sad because again, it's individual classrooms and families at the local level who will be affected, as well as a few new teachers that communities have really embraced and don't want to lose.
State Auditor, where are you?