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MARS Board Meeting Minutes
June 14, 2005
Present: Bruce Kaiser, Kurtis Johnson, William Conners,
Nathanael Fortune, Clifford Fountain, Gene Carlo, Maureen Marshall, Richard
Scortino, Dee Dee Niswonger
The importance of the End of Year Report is not only that individual district’s
funding is based on the numbers in the report, but that the aggregate of these
reports allows the legislature, or the DoE, or other researchers, to accurately
compute the costs of education in the Commonwealth. Therefore it is twice as
important that the End of Year Reports get filed in a timely fashion, and
completely accurately. There are workshops run to help with the filling out of
this report; those needing help are urged to use one of these resources.
The Conference Committee may report out June 15.
There will probably not be a supplemental budget that brings additional money to
education.
House One had 105 million less to distribute than is now under discussion. This
is in line with the Governor’s idea that the problems for education have to do
with accountability more than dollars.
Foundation budget adequacy is the most demanding problem before us; if it is not
solved we will not be able to “get out of the hole”. Both save harmless and the
change of base aid into foundation aid are serious risks for regions;
save/harmless is primarily a regional issue, and by changing the name of base
aid to foundation aid it becomes possible to eliminate all the sources of
funding that go into base aid including the regional incentive aid of 150
million which is all of Chapter 71 now remaining to regions.
State aid to education now makes up 37% of the actual cost of educating the
Commonwealth’s children. 90% of that aid goes to 10% of the communities. Many
districts are experiencing severe decreases in their E & D accounts. Whereas
three years ago many were able to maintain 5%, now 1% is more common. While the
percent of state aid to education drops the percent of local contribution is
increased proportionately. The measurement of wealth is a very pressing issue
just now, as it has been for some time. How do we accurately measure the ability
of one community to pay as compared to another, different community to pay?
One factor in calculating required MLC is the wage adjustment factor. This
factor, used by law, is seen as resulting in inaccuracies by those now working
to improve the state aid percentage for districts. The factor can be manipulated
to reduce state aid, and to increase what communities must pay.
Heat, light, health insurance, and SPED costs are more than 30% of at least the
Quabbin Regional budget. The discussion indicated that our moves toward bringing
equality into the schools through SPED laws have actually resulted in more
inequality than ever, but now the children receiving inadequate services are the
regular day children, while funding goes to serve the SPED children. It was
noted that this situation causes many to fear the inclusion of SPED children in
their districts due to the associated costs, instead of welcoming the
opportunity to serve them, and furthermore, that the services rendered through
SPED are actually ones that benefit all children, and assist all children to
learn more fully. Space issues are now solved by putting regular day students
into inadequate spaces, a switch from the corrected past practice of using
closets and hallways for SPED children. The pressures of inadequate funding are
forcing solutions which are not acceptable to those who are having to make
decisions.
A discussion ensued concerning the DoE proposal concerning the calculation of
the required minimum contribution. One web site which is providing provocative
studies of the proposal is: <http://www.natfortune.org/C70.html> and the DoE
site is: <http://finance1.doe.mass.edu/chapter70/chapter_awmw.html>:
Paying attention to the materials released by the DoE can be helpful for number
crunchers who want to see what happens when various moves are made with the
numbers now available. You are urged to understand the proposal as it is “one of
the players” in the conversation now on-going about Chapter 70.
All the issues above are tied together. All districts must file the End of Year
Report to put accurate numbers into the discussion about the Foundation Budget.
Without accurate numbers, we do not know what is really being spent. Without
that information we cannot develop an adequate state aid and local contribution
combination which will support the schools in a reasonable fashion.
A final discussion was about the current Senate bill S345 which does not serve
regions well, and which appears to send funds to a narrow group of “winners”
while ignoring the same needs of the “losers”. It is hoped that these provisions
in S345 will not receive support.
Respectfully submitted by
Dee Dee Niswonger
For More Information Contact:
Massachusetts Association of Regional Schools
P.O. Box 334, Williamsburg, MA 01096-0334
Tel: 413-268-3607
E-mail:
niswonger@comcast.net
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Massachusetts Association of
Regional Schools