Has anyone seen the article about the proposed FY2004 school budget for St. Mary's County? All county agencies are told no more than 2% increase except the school board, they get 6.5% (approx $3. 5 mil). Yet they submitted a budget request for $13 mil more! What are they doing with the money they have now, let alone another $13 mil? One would think with the state being in budget straits they would have the sense to at least stay closer to what they were allotted.
St. Mary's School Board Budget
- Thread starter alex
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Kain99
Guest
Paying off lawsuits and taking the students to the Mall on field trips.
Tonio
Asperger's Poster Child
A $13 million increase in operating money? What kind of salary increases did the school system negotiate with the two unions? I can't find a copy of the budget request on the school system's Web site.
I think it's pathetic when the school system claims that the county is "cutting" the school budget, when all the county is doing is limiting the amount of increase.
The system needs to get its priorities in order. Something is wrong when the budget goes up each year, and teachers still spend their own money to buy ncessities from their classrooms. School supplies are the first things to get cut from the budget. That's wrong.
I've written before that the central office administrators' jobs should be eliminiated, and these people should be sent back to the classrooms to fill teaching vacancies. That wouldn't mean much money in the short term (probably $750,000 in the first year). It's just the principle of paying educators high salaries to do little more than sit on their butts.
I think it's pathetic when the school system claims that the county is "cutting" the school budget, when all the county is doing is limiting the amount of increase.
The system needs to get its priorities in order. Something is wrong when the budget goes up each year, and teachers still spend their own money to buy ncessities from their classrooms. School supplies are the first things to get cut from the budget. That's wrong.
I've written before that the central office administrators' jobs should be eliminiated, and these people should be sent back to the classrooms to fill teaching vacancies. That wouldn't mean much money in the short term (probably $750,000 in the first year). It's just the principle of paying educators high salaries to do little more than sit on their butts.
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Bruzilla
Guest
As a parent, I can tell you that teachers have not been footing the bill for school supplies for quite some time now. That has been relegated to the wallets and pocketbooks of the parents.
Salaries for teachers haven't gone up much; there are no new schools being constructed; and I don't see too many major renovations going on (even though I think that's covered by a seperate funding line.) So... as I've asked for years... where is all the money going?
Salaries for teachers haven't gone up much; there are no new schools being constructed; and I don't see too many major renovations going on (even though I think that's covered by a seperate funding line.) So... as I've asked for years... where is all the money going?
Tonio
Asperger's Poster Child
A few years ago, the parents at Park Hall ES polled their teachers and found they spent an average of $500 each year on necessity-type supplies. I don't doubt that parents buy these items at other schools. I have the same question you do -- why isn't the tax money that the schools get actually going to the classroom?
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Bruzilla
Guest
Amen Alex! I had to buy the following for three kids this year: paper, folders, pens, pencils, crayons, colored pencils, protractors, compasses, calculators, binders, scissors, erasers, composition books, assignment books, index cards and box, glue, glue sticks, divider sheets, and some other items I know I'm missing. On top of that I had to pay for three locker rentals, art fees, and science lab fees.
If teachers are paying for anything out of pocket it must be decorations for the classroom because the parents are buying the supplies.
If teachers are paying for anything out of pocket it must be decorations for the classroom because the parents are buying the supplies.
Tonio
Asperger's Poster Child
I think you may be right, Bruzilla. The Park Hall survey was done in the early '90s, before schools started sending supply lists home with parents. I once read over the supplies list at Wal-Mart and was dumbfounded at the length and detail. My daughter is still little, so I have a few years to save up. $$$$ You know, when I was a boy, the only things we took to school were pencils and erasers?
Well, up here at our high school they just spent the money to put one of those Dance machines in the lunchroom. You know - it's got a pad with foot markers and a screen that tells you where to put your feet when you dance and you get scored on how well you do?
Now, this is a school where the bathrooms look like war zones. The toilet paper and paper towel dispensers are all broke, the stall door locks are broken, the soap dispensers are broken. And this dance thing is what they spent money on?
Complaining does no good - they just ignore you.
Now, this is a school where the bathrooms look like war zones. The toilet paper and paper towel dispensers are all broke, the stall door locks are broken, the soap dispensers are broken. And this dance thing is what they spent money on?
Complaining does no good - they just ignore you.
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Heretic
Guest
At mu highschool they took the doors off the stalls so people wouldnt smoke, later on they took down the stalls. I never took a crap at school again.
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Bruzilla
Guest
Originally posted by vraiblonde
Well, up here at our high school they just spent the money to put one of those Dance machines in the lunchroom. You know - it's got a pad with foot markers and a screen that tells you where to put your feet when you dance and you get scored on how well you do?
Now, this is a school where the bathrooms look like war zones. The toilet paper and paper towel dispensers are all broke, the stall door locks are broken, the soap dispensers are broken. And this dance thing is what they spent money on?
Complaining does no good - they just ignore you.
Hmmmm... that sounds like the kind of thing a student would vote for.
As nauseating as it was, I looked back through my homeroom pictures from elementary and junior high school, and my low class number was 27 and the high was 29. What is so magical about the 20:1 ratio? Just for the record, I checked with my parents and their average class size in the 1940s was about 30 also.
You don't suppose that the teachers unions are conspiring to limit class sizes to create more jobs for teachers do you???
Tonio
Asperger's Poster Child
That's a good theory. I hadn't thought of that possibility.
In my experience, most of the educators who push smaller classes are researchers and administrators. Maryland's teachers union hasn't talked much about class size, because it has been so focused on MSPAP. The state pushed testing hard for a decade, and the union played obstructionist.
As a matter of fact, Bru, it WAS a few students who voted for it. The student council, to be exact. They had a choice between refurbishing some of the school facilities, getting a dance machine or getting a fancy ice cream machine. The students, because they are so wise and all-knowing, decided to get a dance machine, rationalizing that they could charge 50 cents to use it, thereby making the money back and then some.
What they didn't consider is that, A, very few students enjoy it enough to use their lunch period playing it, and B, at 50 cents a whack, it's going to take a looooooong time for them to even pay for the machine, let alone make a profit.
The president of the student council is, you guessed it, very into the Dance machine thing - apparently he's on a county-wide team. That explains why he pressed for it and got the other council members to go along.