Quality Public Education for All New Jersey Students

 

 
     7-14-11 State GUIDANCE re: Using Additional State Aid as Property Tax Relief in this FY'12 Budget year.PDF
     7-14-11 DOE Guidance on Local Options for using Additional State School Aid in FY'12 State Budget.PDF
     FY'12 State School Aid District-by-District Listing, per Appropriations Act, released 110711
     7-12-11 pm District by District Listing of State Aid for FY'12 - Guidelines to be released later this week (xls)
     Democrat Budget Proposal per S4000, for Fiscal Year 2011-2012
     Additional School Aid [if the school funding formula,SFRA, were fully funded for all districts] per Millionaires' Tax bill S2969
     6-24-11 Democrat Budget Proposal brings aid to all districts
     6-1-11 Supreme Court Justice nominee, Anne Paterson, passed muster with Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday by 11-1 margin
     4-26-11 School Elections, Randi Weingarten in NJ, Special Educ Aid, Shared Services bill
     4-25-11 Charter Schools in Suburbia: More Argument than Agreement
     4-24-11 Major Education Issues in the News
     4-3-11Press of Atlantic City - Pending Supreme Court ruling could boost aid to New Jersey schools
     3-31-11 Charters an Issue in the Suburbs - and - So far, only 7 Separate Questions on April School Budget Ballots
     3-26-11 New Jersey’s school-funding battle could use a dose of reality
     3-25-11 Education Week on School Cutbacks Around The Nation
     Link to Special Master Judge Doyne's Recommendations on School Funding law to the Supreme Court 3-22-11
     GSCS 3-7-11Testimony on State Budget as Proposed by the Governor for FY'12 before the Senate Budget Committee
     Attached to GSCS 3-7-11 Testimony: Marlboro Schools strike historic agreement with instructional aides, bus drivers, bus aides
     GSCS - Local District Listing : Local Funds Transferred to Charter Schools 2001-2010
     GSCS Bar Chart: Statewide Special Education cost percent compared to Regular & Other Instructional cost percent 2004-2011
     GSCS Bar Chart: 2001to 2011 Statewide General Fund Transfers Required from Local District Budgets to Support Charter Schools (Increased from $85M to $317M)
     GSCS Take on Governor's Budget Message
     Gov's Budget Message for Fiscal Year 2010-2011 Today, 2pm
     8-18-10 Property Tax Cap v. Prior Negotiated Agreements a Big Problem for Schools and Communities
     7-22-10 'Summer school falls victim to budget cuts in many suburban towns'
     7-12-10 Assembly passes S29 - the 2% cap bill - 73 to 4, with 3 not voting
     7-8-10 Tax Caps, Education in the News
     GSCS:Tax Cap Exemption needed for Special Education Costs
     7-3-10 Governor Christie and Legislative leaders reached agreement today on a 2% property tax cap with 4 major exemptions
     7-1 and 2- 10 Governor Christie convened the Legislature to address property tax reform
     6-29-10 GSCS - The question remains: ? Whither property Tax Reform
     GSCS On the Scene in Trenton: State Budget poised to pass late Monday...Cap Proposals, Opportunity Scholarship Act in Limbo
     6-28-10 State Budget tops the news today
     GSCS On the Scene in Trenton: Cap Proposals, Opportunity Scholarship Act in Limbo
     6-25-10 Appropriations Act bills for Fiscal Year 2010-2011 available on NJ Legislature website - here are the links
     6-23-10 Trenton News: State Budget on the move...Education Issues
     6-22-10 The Appropriations Act for the State Budget Fiscal Year 2010-2011
     6-22-10 Budget , Cap Proposals & Education News - njspotlight.com
     6-11-10 In the News: State Budget moving ahead on schedule
     6-10-10 Op-Ed in Trenton Times Sunday June 6 2010
     6-8-10 (posted) Education & Related Issues in the News
     Office on Legislative Services Analysis of Department of Educaiton - State Budget for FY'11
     4-23-10 Education issues remain headline news
     4-22-10 School Elections - in the News Today
     4-21-10 DOE posts election results
     Hear about Governor Christie's noontime press conference tonight
     4-21-10 News on School Election Results
     4-21-10 Assoc. Press 'NJ voters reject majority of school budgets'
     4-20-10 Today is School Budget & School Board Member Election Day
     4-18-10 It's About Values - Quality Schools...Your Homes...Your Towns: Sunday front page story and editorial
     4-19-10 GSCS Testimony before the Assembly Budget Committee on State Budget FY'11
     4-13-10 Testimony submitted to Senate Budget Committee
     4-13-10 Commissioner Schundler before Senate Budget Committee - early reports....progress on budget election issue
     4-12-10 'Gov. urges voters to reject school districts' budgets without wage freezes for teachers'
     GSCS 'HOW-TO' GET TRENTON'S ATTENTION ON STATE BUDGET SCHOOL ISSUES FY '11' - Effective and Well-Reasoned Communication with State Leaders is Critical
     4-6-10 'Gov. Chris Chrisite extends dealdine for teacher salary concessions'
     4-6-10 'NJ school layoffs, program cuts boost attention to Apri 20 votes
     4-2-10 Press of Atlantic City lists county impact re: school aid reduction
     4-2-10 'On Titanic, NJEA isn't King of the World'
     Administration's presentation on education school aid in its 'Budget in Brief' published with Governor Christie's Budget Message
     PARENTS ARE CALLING TO EXPRESS THEIR CONCERNS FOR THE SCHOOL AID PICTURE - GSCS WILL KEEP YOU UP-TO-DATE
     4-1-10 Courier Post article reports on Burlington and Camden County district budgets
     4-1-10 Education in the News today
     4-1-10 New Initiatives outlined to encourage wage freezes - reaction
     3-31-10 What's Going on in Local Districts?
     3-29-10 The Record and Asbury Park Press - Editorials
     3-26-10 GSCS: Effective & Well-Reasoned Communication with State Leaders is Critical
     FAQ's on Pension Reform bills signed into law March 22, 2010
     3-26-10 School Aid, Budget Shortfall - Impt Related Issues - Front Page News
     3-25-10 STATE BUDGET FY11 PROCESS - IMPORTANT TRENTON DATES - April through May 2010
     3-23-10 GSCS Testimony presented to Senate Budget Committee on State Budget FY'11
     GSCS - Formula Aid Loss and Percent Loss by District - Statewide
     GSCS - Formula Aid Loss under 50%, by County
     GSCS - Formula Aid Loss of 50% or more, by County
     3-23-10 ' N.J. Gov. Chris Christie signs pension, benefits changes for state employees'
     3-23-10 State Budget Issues in the News
     3-21-10 Reform bills up for a vote in the Assembly on Monday, March 22
     GSCS FYI - GSCS will be testifying onTuesday in Bergen County on the State Budget
     3-21-10 Sunday News from Around the State - School Communities, School Budgets and State Budget Issues
     3-17-10 Budget News - Gov. Chris Christie proposes sacrifices
     3-17-10 Budget News - NJ Schools Stunned By Cuts
     3-16-10 Link to Budget in Brief publication
     3-15-10mid-day: 'Gov. Christie plans to cut NJ school aid by $800M'
     3-14-10 'Christie will propose constitutional amendment to cap tax hikes in N.J. budget'
     3-15-10 'N.J. taxpayers owe pension fund $45.8 billion' The Record
     3-11-10 Public Hearings on State Budget for FY11 posted on NJ Legislature website
     3-11-10 'GOP vows tools to cut expenses, tighter caps'
     3-9-10 'NJ leaders face tough choices on budget'
     Flyer: March 2 Education Summit Keynote Speaker - Education Commissioner Bret Schundler - Confirmed
     3-5-10 HomeTowne Video taping plus interviews of GSCS Summit@Summit
     3-5-10 GSCS Summit@Summit with Bret Schundler to be lead topic on Hall Institute's weekly 2:30 pm podcast today
     3-4-10 GSCS Email-Net: Summit @ Summit Report - A New Day in Trenton?
     3-4-10 'NJ education chief Bret Schundler tells suburban schools to expect more cuts in aid'
     3-4-10 'School aid cuts unavoidable during NJ budget crisis'
     3-3-10 'Public Education in N.J.: Acting NJ Comm of Educ Bret Schundler says 'Opportunity'
     2-24-10 'Tight funds raise class sizes that districts long sought to cut'
     2-22-10 Christie and unions poised to do batttle over budget cuts'
     2-22-10 Trenton Active Today
     2-19-10 'Acting NJ education commissioner hoping other savings can ward off cuts'
     Flyer for March 2 Education 'Summit@Summit'
     2-16-10 'Christie Adopts Corzine Cuts, Then Some'
     2-14-10 'FAQ's on NJ's state of fiscal emergency declaration by Gov. Christie'
     State Aid 2010 Reserve Calculation and Appeal Procedures
     2-12-10 News Coverage: Governor Christie's message on actions to address current fiscal year state budget deficits
     FY2010 Budget Solutions - PRESS PACKET
     School Aid Withheld Spreadsheet
3-25-11 Education Week on School Cutbacks Around The Nation
Published Online: March 25, 2011 'Budget Cuts Hitting Deeper in Districts Nationwide' Even in the midst of an economic downturn, there were some programs that Superintendent Robert P. Grimesey believed his district in Orange County, Va., would never have to cut. But over the past two years, those programs have fallen by the wayside. ...

  EDUCATION WEEK - Published Online: March 25, 2011

Budget Cuts Hitting Deeper in Districts Nationwide

By Christina A. Samuels

 

 

Even in the midst of an economic downturn, there were some programs that Superintendent Robert P. Grimesey believed his district in Orange County, Va., would never have to cut.

But over the past two years, those programs have fallen by the wayside. Summer school for kindergartners through 8th graders? Gone. Instrumental-strings program? Cut. Money for replacing school buses? Eliminated, along with a weekly 30-minute program in computer technology for elementary students.

The after-school sports program in the 5,000-student district started requiring fees from students to participate. Parents and students are holding fundraisers to pay for transportation to away games.

“There’s no light at the end of the tunnel currently in Orange County,” said Mr. Grimesey, whose district is in the north-central part of the state.

“There’s a lot of resilience in the school community,” he added, including from teachers who are willing to provide extra tutoring and other services to students that they once were paid for. But state lawmakers should not believe that kind of commitment can be sustained indefinitely, he warned.

The situation in the Orange County district, which has seen its budget drop from $46 million to $41 million over the past two years, is all too familiar to school leaders around the country, as districts come face to face with the accumulated effects of a slow-recovering national economy, state budget cuts, and the disappearance of federal stimulus funds, which allowed some districts to plug budget holes for a short time.

Like Orange County school officials, district leaders elsewhere are having to cut programs once thought untouchable, expand class sizes, reduce basic transportation and school sports, and, in some cases, even shorten the school year.

Orange County, in fact, may be doing slightly better than some: The upcoming budget year is expected to see a net increase in revenue of $427,000—enough to rehire a few teacher’s aides and pay for some student-activity transportation.

Bus Service Gutted

But in the 1,600-student Bayless district in suburban St. Louis, the school board voted to eliminate all bus transportation this school year, in a move expected to save $250,000. Missouri requires districts to provide transportation to students who live more than 3 ½ miles from school, and all of the district’s students live within that radius, the district says.

In Duval County, Fla., the school board chairman touched off an uproar—and a national debate about the worth of school sports—when he said that the 123,500-student district might have to eliminate all school sports next year to plug a budget hole. The district is facing a possible $97 million shortfall, out of a total operating budget of about $1 billion for the next budget year, and has had cuts for the past four years. Cutting interscholastic sports would save about $6 million, school board Chairman W.C. Gentry told The Florida Times-Union, in Jacksonville. The board has made no final decision on the cuts.

Pamela J. Homan, the superintendent of the 21,000-student Sioux Falls, S.D., district, is bracing herself for the recommendations of 19 committees she created to scour the school budget for programs to cut. The district will face a $7 million shortfall in local funding from an annual budget that is currently around $130 million.

One program possibly on the chopping block: a transition program for 9th graders at one high school. It may go because it’s not in all the high schools, Ms. Homan said. An elementary reading-intervention program could also be under consideration for cuts.

What could help Sioux Falls is that the community may approve taxing itself to pay for programs it deems necessary. For several years, a panel of outside financial experts has been invited to take a look at the district’s budget, to see if it is running as efficiently as it can, Ms. Homan said. Asking the community to support programs is more successful when people outside the school district can confirm that the programs are necessary, she said.

It’s becoming more uncommon to find a district without financial problems now, said John D. Musso, the executive director of the Association of School Business Officials International, based in Reston, Va. “All the low-hanging fruit is gone. ... [Y]ou talk about the light at the end of the tunnel, but I don’t think people see the tunnel anymore.”

Chance for Changes?

In California, the budget woes started earlier and have cut deeper than in many other places in the country. Still more cuts are coming if state lawmakers do not allow voters to decide if they want to extend some temporary vehicle, sales, and income taxes. The tax hikes, put into place in February 2009 to balance the state budget, will expire in July. Preserving the taxes would close about half of the state’s projected $26 billion deficit. Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed a budget of about $84.6 billion this year.

San Francisco Deputy Superintendent Myong Leigh, who oversees his district’s policy and operations departments, said that the city put together a budget that would shave $113 million over two years from a budget that is currently $490 million. Like many other California districts, San Francisco has cut its school year to 176 days, from 180. The 56,000-student system has also halved professional development for teachers, from six days to three days per school year.

“We still have reduced class sizes at the K-3 level, but that’s something that might be on the table,” Mr. Leigh said.

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James W. Guthrie, the director of educational policy studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas and a senior fellow at the Bush Institute located there, said he knows the cuts are painful.

However, he said, per-pupil spending has been stable or rising for decades, even including adjustments for inflation.

“If you can find a district that is taking this as a serious opportunity to reform programs, I want to know about it so I can visit them,” he said of the financial crunch.

Some of Mr. Guthrie’s suggestions: Get rid of the practice of paying teachers more for master’s degrees and cut programs that haven’t been proven to improve student achievement.

But Mr. Guthrie said local leaders, pressured by local politics, are unlikely to make such changes.

“The governors are having to do this,” Mr. Guthrie said, giving examples such as Govs. Scott Walker of Wisconsin and John Kasich of Ohio. The two Republicans have pursued measures to curb collective bargaining by teachers and other public employees, arguing that union clout drives up costs for school districts and other government employers.

Ms. Homan, the superintendent in Sioux Falls, disagreed with any suggestion that a handful of policy prescriptions works for all districts. And she said her district already has scoured its budget for programs that don’t work. “If there’s a program that isn’t contributing to the mission, it’s gone,” she said.

Vol. 30, Issue 26