Fairfax County Public Schools Proposed Budget is Up (how much, school district)

[car54]

Originally Posted by tgbwc

Update: Earlier this month, the Gov. reversed this decision and decided that the LCI will be recalculated, which is a positive for NoVA school districts.

Have you been reading about Central Falls High School in Rhode Island?

They fired the whole damned place...teachers, principal, staffers...all got the boot. That would save some serious money, wouldn't it? LOL

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by car54

Have you been reading about Central Falls High School in Rhode Island?

They fired the whole damned place...teachers, principal, staffers...all got the boot. That would save some serious money, wouldn't it? LOL

Oh yeah, that's crazy. It seems as though they were fired over contract negotiations more than student performance.

You know, I consider myself a pretty good teacher and if I were looking for a job, that would be the LAST place I would apply.

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by car54

I thought FCPS spends money like drunken sailors....they even have Blackberries for cryin' out loud!

I have a list of alternate cuts which I'll try to post soon. Guess what! Your Blackberries made the list with a savings of $800k!

[novajs]

Originally Posted by tgbwc

I believe Fairfax spends about $1,200 less per student than Montgomery.

Montgomery county has full day kindergarten. They don't get off half day on Monday either.

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by tgbwc

I have a list of alternate cuts which I'll try to post soon. Guess what! Your Blackberries made the list with a savings of $800k!

Alternate cuts proposal

[michgc]

Thanks for adding that! I'm surprised I still haven't seen full-day kindergarten eliminated or did I miss that? I won't miss the field trips cut - they are a waste of time and money. My daughter has gone to the same museum two years in a row and they plan to go again this year. Huh? There are hundreds of museums in the DC area - why keep going to the same one? And they barely spend any time there.

[tgbwc]

Just to clarify, the above budget reductions are proposed by the Fairfax County Federation of Teachers as an alternative to the superintendent's proposal and were sent to the board this week. A flier today said that if these cuts were instituted along with $ gained from a recalculation in the state's LCI, programs such as elementary band, strings, and full day K could be kept off the chopping block. Teachers could also receive a 1% COLA and step.

[lchoro]

It turns out that the budget problem is primarily due to the shortfall in funding the FCPS employees' retirement benefits.

FCTA board members attended today's Fairfax County Public Schools budget forum, held at Marshall High School.

The FCTA asked why the school board is urging the supervisors to raise taxes by $81.9M although only $9M is needed to pay for next year's expected increase in student enrollment.

The school superintendent acknowledged that the reason is the increased cost in employee benefits, especially pensions. According to the schools' proposed FY2011 budget, employee benefits costs are increasing by $98M, of which $71M is for pensions and another $15M is for retiree medical benefits.

School board urges higher taxes to pay for pensions (Fairfax County Taxpayers Alliance)

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by lchoro

It turns out that the budget problem is primarily due to the shortfall in funding the FCPS employees' retirement benefits.



School board urges higher taxes to pay for pensions (Fairfax County Taxpayers Alliance)

I agree that there are alternate cuts that could be made without hurting the students so much in the classroom (see my earlier alternative cuts which FCFT presented). However, the article also makes it sound like school employee benefits are grand, when in reality I believe the school board only contributes $100/month towards retiree premiums. It also makes teacher salaries seem overly generous. Salaries in August 2011 will be the same as they were in September 2008. Is the article lumping county employees (who back in 2001/2002 were receiving 4-5% raises)with FCPS employees (who at the same time were receiving 2%)?

[lchoro]

The employer (taxpayer) is being asked to pick up the bulk of cost of making up the shortfall. They plan to increase the employer contribution from 9.7 to 14.2 percent. FCPS teacher contribution rises from just 3.2 percent to a still lowly 4.0 percent.