Strickland Education Plan, $6,000 per student base
10 Jan 2007
Since the topic of school funding and levies is a top one here in NWO, something that might interest you from Licking County Pro-Active Citizens (With a major thanks to Jill at Writes Like She Talks, Jill is the “go to” person in following State Education issues in my opinion.) As reported stated by State Rep. Dan Dodd:
Strickland’s school finance plan would establish a per-pupil funding base of $6,000, said Dodd. Although details are still being worked out, he said, it would not require any increase in state tax rates. The hope, in fact, is that the reform plan would reduce the number and size of local school levies. Money needed, he said, would come from a redistribution of taxes already being paid.
I’m curious how this would impact our local per pupil spending which is around the $10,000 mark at tps…what I don’t know is how much of our local per pupil cost is state money versus federal or local levy funds…
January 10th, 2007 at 8:52 pmGood question, I’ve had a hard time even trying to nail down a cost per student. I’ve seen ranges from 6,500 to 11,000.
January 10th, 2007 at 9:02 pmI would be interested in knowing more details, too. The concept of spreading out the wealth to all children is past due, but the details, the details!
January 10th, 2007 at 10:20 pmHA! Found what I was looking for – the finance report for the Toledo Public School system:
here
Page 172 gives us a ten year breakdown as far as revenue from all of the sources.
January 10th, 2007 at 10:24 pmWith a total revenue number of $474,999,153 for 2005 and a total expenditure of $500,422,632 for 2005 and 32,998 students listed for 2005 you can see what the per student numbers are.
January 10th, 2007 at 10:35 pm[he clunks his calculator to see if it was listing funny numbers] Wow! $15,165 per student. Expensive children, or expensive administration, or…
January 11th, 2007 at 7:57 amPer child spending has never worked to help education. Look at D.C. they have some of the nations smallest classrooms and some of the highest per child spending but yet the districts schools are horrible.
The money would be better invested in other areas of education. Such as technology open to all students, nontraditional educational theories, and better teaching incentives to get better teachers.
January 11th, 2007 at 10:29 amPer pupil spending. I did the math on TPS per pupil spending over the last couple of years also. Using the total budget and the number of pupils reported in TPS’s annual report.
It is always a lot higher than the Blade reports. They aren’t doing the math correctly I think. OR they don’t include the building costs or something. Our district is very top heavy. Very, very, very top heavy.
January 11th, 2007 at 11:40 amHow you define what’s in the cost is key. That’s why Blackwell’s 65% solution was so objectionable – because of what he left out of the solution – like, librarians, among others. I have very strong opinions about what history and our own experience teaches us about planning policy and action around an average number for a population as diverse as Ohio’s schoolchildren. Needs and resources differ so dramatically. Fair is fair, except when they have different meanings.
January 11th, 2007 at 1:29 pmAt a meeting last night, an individual was relating a story from Columbus about an education committee meeting in the House…the legislator asked – “How much more money is needed for the local k-12 educational system?” After a very long answer, he again asked – “but HOW MUCH … because ‘more’ is not an answer.”
January 12th, 2007 at 1:47 pmHey guys, a little late in posting this but earlier this year I did an analysis (just the general fund) to show how much the per pupil cost is, how it is funded, how much it has increased, etc. When you have questions like this, check out TPSINFO.COM. A lot of the time you may find we did some research on this subject.
Anyway here is the link to the analysis
January 12th, 2007 at 2:08 pmThanks Steven, at first I was confused because you are tabulating the data differently than the TPS information such as $299,709,964 is what you have listed for revenue minus charter for 2005 – yet the TPS document states total revenue for 2005 was $474,999,153, you have it listed as total revenue per student of $9,116 but I don’t understand the difference in that number compared to taking the number of students divided by the revenue listed on the TPS link.
I’m missing something somewhere, and yes, I have never claimed to have math be my strong suit.
January 12th, 2007 at 2:27 pmBefore we start talking about funding, we need to ask the basic questions:
What do we deem an adequate education in Ohio?
What are the basic requirements, instructional delivery needed, to meet the adequate education requirement defined?
How much does it cost to provide an “adequate education”?
Then we can talk about how to fund it.
Every blue ribbon committee on education either does not tackle this question or deems it too difficult to address!
$6,000 per student would result in a 13.5% increase over the $5,283 per student for this year. It would result in about a $22 million increase for TPS – About what a new 7.99 mill levy would bring in. TPS would probably consume this money in increased costs (mostly wages and benefits) and need another infusion of cash in about 4 years unless the amount is indexed to keep up with inflation.
TPS must address their cost structure to meet current enrollment. They also need to look at ways to reduce the cost of instructional delivery like on line courses for honor students. This would be a major productivity improvement and in the end result in annual savings of several million dollars depending on how many students are enrolled in such courses. Just one example of many that would transform TPS into a more efficient organization.
January 12th, 2007 at 2:41 pmLisa,
You math is fine – when you add all the items up it does come up to the figure you found.
The $424 million is the total for all TPS funds including the general fund, capital improvement fund, title 1 funds, grants, etc. It does not include the building fund. The analysis deals only with the general fund which is where the $6,000 per student goes – the state foundation monies are unrestricted (or so the state says), but in reality the state places certain mandates on how money can be spent – like classroom reduction. Therefore, the district does not have complete discretion over how this money will be spent. It can make budgeting difficult.
When the district talks about needing new money they never talk about the other funds and how they can shift some expenses. The deficit being projected is for the general fund only! Link to forecast –
January 12th, 2007 at 2:50 pmOctober 30, 2006 five year financial forecast
Link doesn’t seem to work – let’s try this again.
January 12th, 2007 at 2:53 pmOctober 30, 2006 five year financial forecast
I agree with part of what you stated Steven especially when it comes to the first part that we should know what consists of a “good education” before we address funding.
I don’t however agree with TPS providing online classes for honor roll high school students. Students who are of high GPA’s already do have access to the Post Secondary Option Program where they can take online classes at the University of Toledo as well as actual college classes at UT, Owens, and Mercy College as well as I believe a few others. I don’t know what the numbers are as far as TPS students taking advantage of this, but having TPS do this would be a duplication of what is available to a good portion of these students which is paid for by the State separately. Owens offers online classes too but I don’t know if they allow Post Secondary Op students to take them.
January 12th, 2007 at 2:54 pmThanks Steven, math has never been my forte, you should see me try to assist my 12 year old with her math homework.
I’m happy when I can balance my accounts. Which is another reason discussion like this is important those of us like me who are “math challenged” can ask questions and learn information.
January 12th, 2007 at 2:59 pmLisa,
My idea about on line classes would utilize resources such as UT, Owens, etc. And you are right, the classes could easily be college courses where students would get credit toward the HS diploma and earn college credits just as you do know for post secondary classes. I’d thought of it, I just did not go into detail. The example was used to show how productivity could be improved and as we are discussing it could be set up to use existing resources.
TPS discourages students from taking post secondary classes – it has a cost to them as TPS must pay the tuition (don’t know if it is a reduced amount or not). I could tell you a horror story about my son taking post secondary classes while at TTA.
Cheers
January 12th, 2007 at 3:48 pmSteven, that’s interesting, two of mine took Post Secondary Op classes thru Springfield. I was told and had read that the local schools are reimbursed in full from the State. I didn’t think any of the expenses were picked up by the local school district.
January 12th, 2007 at 4:07 pmLisa,
I’ll check on it again, but my info came from some people in the know but it is 4 years old. The state gives the district the foundation money and it was my understanding that any cost was to come from those funds. So, this cuts into their state funding. The money comes from the state, but I am not aware of any additional reimbursements for post secondary beyond the per pupil foundation aid. But let’s check again and make sure.
January 12th, 2007 at 4:39 pmSteven, I did find out by visiting the Ohio Department of Education site I found out that 131 students from TPS used Post Secondary Op. I also know that we had to agree to this when my last one did Post secondary op this year’s first semester:
January 12th, 2007 at 4:55 pmIMO, no matter how you slice it, TPS’s budget problems can mostly be blamed on the top-heavy administrative costs (too many highly-paid people doing nothing of consequence) in relation to the education of children.
Just like the top-heavy administration in the city of Toledo, all of those highly but unnecessary people can give you a dozen reasons for their existence, when the operation would run more smoothly without them. . .
January 14th, 2007 at 2:32 pm