Published: September 30, 2009 10:22 pm      

NA-FC talks cuts

School board discusses $3.5 million in cuts, improving academic performance, more at retreat

New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated School Corp. board members showed shock on their faces and some gasped as they looked at their future via a long-term forecast of their general fund, which pays mostly for salaries.

The overhead projector showed that by 2011 the district’s cash balance would be depleted and the district would be in the red by more than $3.6 million.

“We have a problem,” Fred McWhorter, director of business, told the board members and Superintendent Bruce

Hibbard at their retreat at Wooded Glen Retreat Center on Wednesday.

He asked the board what he just said.

“We have a problem,” Lee Ann Wiseheart, board vice president, repeated back.

“Two years from now I don’t want you to come back and say ‘Brad [Snyder, deputy superintendent] and Fred, why didn’t you tell us?’ We’re telling you now,” McWhorter said. He said this year the district will likely have a surplus of $20,162 to add to their beginning cash balance of more than $4.2 million. However, he said that surplus is due to the stimulus money.

McWhorter said with no new state funding for the next two years and a health insurance premium increase next year is causing the district to spend more than they’re taking in. That health insurance increase will cost $1 million if it only goes up 12 percent, which McWhorter said is a low figure. He said the cheapest offer right now is an 18.9 percent increase.

McWhorter said the district will be forced to turn to depleting their cash balance and rainy day funds to make ends meet, if no changes are made.

“We’re about to see some rainy days ahead,” he said.

The solution, he said, is to cut between $3.5 million to $4 million from the budget soon. The longer they wait, the more that will need to be cut, he said.

Hibbard said he will meet with his administrative team to talk about possible solutions, that range from putting a referendum on the ballot to receive more money from taxpayers, cutting programs and/or teachers.

Snyder said this may be the time to examine programs that are great for kids, but have no effect on academic achievement, such as camps and maintaining swimming pools.

Hibbard said the district needs to increase academic achievement to lure in more students either by families moving to the area or by transfer requests, which will help increase state funding. To do that, he said the district needs to be careful to not increase class sizes too much by cutting too may teachers, which would hinder that goal.

Hibbard said he’ll present the board with a report on possible solutions during a school board work session sometime in November.



SETTING GOALS

The board agreed that the issue of making cuts while working to keep those from affecting academic achievement is something that needs to be a new school board goal. Another new goal discussed, involved enhancing the integrity of the district’s academic programs. Hibbard said the district can achieve that by setting a series of short-cycle assessments to make sure students are learning along the way and making changes if students aren’t progressing through the necessary curriculum. He said these short-cycle assessment will help improve ISTEP scores.

The board also talked about last year’s goals/continuing statements of support, where they stood and whether to keep them. The board decided to get rid of the goals dealing with curriculum mapping (which will now only be done in English/language arts and math classes), the goal on increasing attendance at professional development sessions (which was achieved) and one on improving relations with the teachers’ association, which board members said they’d like to do via work sessions rather than the lunch meetings they have previously been doing.

Goals they will keep include improving the culture of service, achieving Adequate Yearly Progress and improving graduation rates.

The board will officially vote on the final board goals at an upcoming school board meeting.



STRATEGIC PLAN

Hibbard also talked about the need for a strategic plan, which would possibly add more goals to the board’s list.

He said the district needs to formulate a plan on where they plan to be in 2020 as well as making sure the district keeps up with changing enrollment trends. He mentioned that there’s extra room at some schools, which may mean boundary lines need to be changed. He also said an optimal school size needs to be figured out.

Hibbard said he realizes the former Resources for Results committee looked into many of these issues. However, he said this time he hopes to form a large committee with a broad range of people from teachers, to administrators, to parents to make sure everyone is represented.

“Transparency is important,” he said.

He said the district needs a two-year action plan developed soon to address academic achievement, including short-cycle assessments. He said “right-sizing” the district, which would include moving boundary lines and possibly closing buildings, would take longer.

He said if academic achievement goes up, then enrollment will likely follow.

“If you want to see this place turn around, that’s your best marketing tool,” he said.

During the boards two day retreat they also talked about the employee classification system, how students are graded, educational framework and ended with a talk from Michael Adamson, with the Indiana School Boards Association.

No final action was taken during the retreat.