LCPS Efficiency Study Released

Deriding the School Board and LCPS administration for inefficiency and waste is a popular pasttime among many of Loudoun's citizens. Not a week goes by when I don't read or hear from somebody about it, and about once a month someone suggests ominously that all LCPS needs is a good audit to finally expose parade of financial skeletons.

And so it would seem that a comprehensive year-long look into LCPS operations (PDF, 1.8MB) would be noted with great interest, yet the community seems to have met the oft-cried for review with a big yawn. Of the five local newspapers that I read regularly, only two (Washington Post, Leesburg Today) carried articles about it. A third (Loudoun Times Mirror) covered it in a blog post. I encourage you not to satisfy yourself with the articles. Read the report's 10-page executive summary. Those reporters who did write about the study focused on the net $2.2 million in savings that the study's authors estimate could be saved over five years if all of their recommendations are implemented (most of which would actually require changes by the Board of Supervisors to the land use approval process and not by LCPS).

The study includes a long list of commendations but also a number of solid recommendations. Much of the first chapter (Administration) focuses on how the School Board can improve, and they are sensible recommendations. This report will help us to improve if we can avoid getting bogged down in day-to-day worries to focus on long-term strategies, and I look forward to a further review together with my colleagues.

Ultimately of course, LCPS and the School Board answer not to the experts who conducted the study, not to the state government that oversaw the study and not to the national media who rank LCPS among the best. We answer to the people of this community, and the conclusions of this study are just more information that you can use to assess whether LCPS is meeting the challenge given to it by the community it serves.

Conference Report #4: Teacher Recruitment (Fishing in a Puddle)

The simple fact is that the supply of highly qualified new teachers is not enough to satisfy the demand. The shortage of teachers is especially acute among minority populations, making it very difficult to build a faculty that reflects the diversity of the student population. I already knew these things, but I attended a session to learn more in the hopes that it would inspire new ideas in me. Here's what I discovered:

• Special Education, Mathematics and Science are the most difficult subjects to find teachers for.
• Virginia graduated 3,066 new teachers from its teaching schools in 2005, 3,407 in 2006. Loudoun County alone needs more than 800 new teachers per year, and we're fourth in size among Virginia school divisions (Prince William, Virgnina Beach and Fairfax are larger). These four divisions alone could swallow every new Virginia teaching graduate, leaving 130 other school divisions to look elsewhere.
• States across the country offer signing bonuses, tuition forgiveness, free graduate courses, housing assistance and more to fill their toughest positions.
• 20% of new teachers leave the profession within three years. Half leave because of job dissatisfaction and those most likely to leave are those with the highest college entrance exam scores.
• Most state and federal programs that Virginia teachers would qualify for require that they teach in underserved or underpeforming schools, meaning that they won't get those incentives to teach here in Loudoun. We've got to create our own incentives.
  

In the midst of this environment many in our community dispute whether we should offer raises to our teachers every year. You can bet that I'll bring this up again when budget time rolls around.

Capital Planning

Last week's joint meeting between the Board of Supervisors and the School Board was pivotal, I think. For the first time several members of the public showed up to speak, and more were in the audience. A majority of the elected officials and significant representation from the senior staff of both boards were present. It wasn't a huge leap in raw numbers, but it was definitely a different kind of feeling in the room.

At the meeting each elected member was handed a sizable stack of information regarding capital facilities planning, which is drawing keen interest in at the moment given the conflict between the two boards on the acquisition of school sites.

In that packet is a single page that I am finding to be of particular interest. It is the 2008 Capital Facility Standards, which shows that the County has formulas for deciding how many of any given type of public facility are needed based on the county's population.

For instance, the Standards show that for every 25,000 residents there should be a Fire & Rescue Station. With our current population, that translates into 10 Fire & Rescue Stations. We have 11, so previous Boards of Supervisors have met that need. Interestingly there is a separate category for "Fire & Rescue Station West," one for every 10,000 residents. According to the Standards we need four of them, but we have eight. The standards also call for a "Community Park" for every 10,000 residents. That would mean 28 countywide. There are five.

Now I don't want to turn this into a battle between constituencies about who's getting their fair share or who's representative is bringing home the bacon. Everything doesn't grow at equal rates, the system of planned developments and proffers has skewed the distribution somewhat over time and other fiscal and political realities are at play. Instead, reflect that our community's true priorities are reflected not in campaign literature or rhetoric from the dais but in the choices we have made as we have grown so quickly. Until recently Loudoun adequately planned for school capacity, education is a very high priority of our residents. Look over the following non-educational Standards and how they have been met (or not) and see whether you can piece together the priorities:

Where we have what we need, more or less:

Capital Facility	Need	Actual
Animal Shelter	1	1
Health Clinic	1	1
Senior Center	3	3
Respite Center	2	2
Sheriff Substation	4	3
Fire & Rescue Station (East)	10	11

What we have too little of:

Capital Facility	Need	Actual
Libraries (by square feet)	6	4
Mental Retardation Residential Facilities	13	7
Mental Health Residential Facilities	19	12
Regional Park & Ride Lot	12	1
Community Park & Ride Lot	57	16
Recreation Center	4	1
District Park	11	1
Community Park	28	5
Juvenile Detention Center	2	1
Youth Shelter	1	1
Transitional Homeless Shelter	3	1
Emergency Homeless Shelter	3	2

Where we have more than the Standard calls for:

Capital Facility	Need	Actual
Government Office Space (sf)	281,638	706,232
Western Fire & Rescue Stations	4	8

What we just don't have:

• Juvenile Probation Residence (1)
• Teen Center (1)
• MHSA Adolescent Treatment Center (3)
• MHSA Adolescent 16-17 Group Home (3)
• MHSA Adolescent 12-15 Group Home (1)
• Juvenile Assessment Center (1)
• Transitional IL Residence (1)

Something to think about.

High Energy Costs Force New Thinking

Next Tuesday begins the new fiscal year, but already LCPS is working on the next operating budget, anticipating a very tight year. In the midst of this I find stories of school districts around Virginia and the DC region changing some fundamental operating assumptions in order to save energy costs. Longer walks to school, elimination of field trips, four-day work weeks and even four-day school weeks are among the solutions that public school districts are turning to.

Henry County, VA (link): "every school system employee will only work Monday through Thursday this summer – a mandatory schedule." Summer school is also on a 4-day schedule. "The school system will save about $100,000. That includes utility cost, fuel for the buses, and commuting cost for the employees."

Montgomery County, MD (link): "The school board last night approved a change to its transportation policy that gives officials emergency powers to extend the distances that students walk to school next year if rising diesel prices leave the school system in fiscal distress."

James City, VA (link): "Hundreds of students may be walking to school this fall if the division scales back on bus routes. So-called “non-transportation zones” would affect students who live within a half mile of their elementary school or within a mile of middle or high school.

Wayneboro, VA (link): "Waynesboro school leaders hope to beat back the heat of rising energy costs this summer by moving to a four-day work week. School divisions in Richmond and Chesterfield County are looking at similar summer energy-saving options."

And around the country (USA Today): "The reality of rising fuel prices cost students in a Tennessee school district their bus ride to school this week on the last day of the year. In Minnesota, a district west of Minneapolis plans to eliminate classes every Monday to come up with the extra $65,000 it needs to fill its buses' tanks. And in North Carolina, Nash-Rocky Mount Public Schools teachers have scaled back the number of field trips this spring to save fuel."

Teacher Raises Around the Region

Of the ten Washington metro jurisdictions, eight are raising teacher salaries this year. Two are not, and Loudoun is one of them. We are still behind the same three that we were behind last year: Fairfax, Prince George's and Montgomery Counties, but by a greater degree.

Past post: Teacher Salaries (Concisely)

School Lunch Budgeting

Today's Washington Post features a poorly-titled front page story called Schools Get a Lesson in Lunch Line Economics about the cost of providing school lunches and the cost of not providing them well. It leaves out statistics about Loudoun County, so I thought I'd provide a few for you.

• Most Loudoun Schools serve both breakfast and lunch. Menus and prices are available online.
• Prices range from $1.30 for breakfast to $2:30 for lunch in Middle & High schools. Adults pay $3.20 for lunches.
• Breakfast meals, even at that inexpensive price, actually turn a profit for LCPS.
  
• The price of all full-price meals will increase $0.10 for the next school year.
  
• There is a separate line item in the Board of Supervisors budget to reduce the cost of lunches for all full-price meals. This year the amount is $900,000.
  
• Four kids eating lunch at school every day will cost their parents about $184 per month. The $0.10 increase pushes that up to $192.
• LCPS is the largest food service provider in the County, providing more meals to more people.
  

Note that the cost of the things that LCPS must buy (milk & bread are cited in the story) is increasing much faster than the 3% inflation that most folks like to reference. The same is true for most other items in our budget.

I have had lunch with my kids in their elementary cafeterias nearly every Tuesday for the past five years, and this year I have breakfast at a Middle School every Friday. By my count I am approaching my 200th meal at LCPS. I have seen significant improvements in the food quality over time, and I hope that the budget pressures will not reverse that trend. The food service workers will always have my thanks for how well they serve our kids.

Budget Postscripts

At last night's School Board meeting there was a palpable relief among School Board members and staff alike, streaked with physical weariness from long hours in recent days. I am very eager to begin writing about topics other than the FY09 budget, but we're not quite done with it yet.

We actually get about five different budgets from the Board of Supervisors, the Operating Budget is only one of them. The next big one is the Capital Improvement Plan. We have separate budget for the school lunch program. Last night we wrapped the last of the voting on another, the Capital Asset Preservation Program (CAPP), basically our physical plant maintenance budget. It includes things like replacing HVAC units, windows, resurfacing parking lots and sidewalks and roofs and repairs to athletic facilities. This was created as a separate budget back in the mid 90s in order to keep these things from competing with the Operating Budget for funding, which had led to LCPS falling behind and a special bond issue on the ballot just to play maintenance catch-up.

(Good Washington Post article here)

This year, the Board of Supervisors cut our CAPP budget by approximately 70%, down to $1.4M. I don't have an electronic copy of it to share, let me know if you really really want one. So, needless to say a lot of projects planned for the upcoming year got pushed out to future years. Assistant Superintendent for Support Services Jeff Platenberg last night described the significant impact on our energy efficiency resulting from delays in roof, window and HVAC replacements. I tried to make one change to it by delaying the resurfacing of the Broad Run High School tennis courts in favor of new HVAC units at Sterling Middle School and Catoctin Elementary. This was not staff's recommendation because those HVAC units aren't on their last legs and the tennis courts are... enough to be a safety issue for kids who play on them and apparently enough that they could not be used for competition. I didn't get any takers.

Finally, I kept a record of motions and votes throughout our reconciliation meeting on Monday night. I thought you might be interested to see what was proposed, who proposed it, and how the voting went. BTW, an 'A' vote means either Abstained or Absent. I used 'x' when a motion received no second and was not subject to a vote.

FY09 LCPS Reconciliation Budget Motions

Final Budget Votes, FY09

The superintendent's recommended budget changes remained largely intact last night through several attempts by members of the school board to reinstate various positions on his list. The only two changes approved were the implementation of Full-Day Kindergarten to three of the four under-enrolled elementary schools (Aldie, Middleburg, Lincoln and Hillsboro). The School Board did not determine which of the three schools would benefit from the program. The Superintendent asked the School Board not to create the program because we do not have a path forward to Full-Day Kindergarten in all schools, primarily because of space limitations.

The second change was in support of our classified employees, who will receive two more paid holidays than last year, for a total of six. The original plan called for four additional days to be implemented but on the whole the Board felt limited by this year's budget restrictions.

While some of the funds for the changes come from a small reduction in the number of interactive whiteboards to be purchased, the Board did not respond to my strong push to remove the whiteboards from the budget and so next year each Middle School will be fully outfitted with them, as the High Schools were this year.

Over the course of the evening additional cuts came to light as members attempted to cut purchases that, as it turned out, were already cut by the Assistant Superintendents to meet their 5.8% reduction commitments. For example, when I looked for funds for speech therapists by cutting the new PFHS scoreboard and new expiring security stickers, we were informed that they had already been cut over the course of the past week. I think that parents, teachers and other school staff will discover many small cuts like these, primarily once school opens again in the fall.

I commend the LCPS headquarters staff, who worked very hard all through the budget season and balanced this budget by keeping the impact out of the classroom as best they could. They do an excellent job throughout the year.

Final Budget questions

Two hours before the budget reconciliation meeting begins, here are the final questions, the lion's share were asked on Friday and over the weekend by Ms. Bergel, with a few by Ms. Godfrey. There's one from me at the end but it wasn't a budget question, they must have thrown it in there just in case, but it does bring up an important point... the Supervisors cut the LCPS maintenance budget as well as the operating budget.

Final Budget questions (76-86)

You'll see that Ms. Bergel is looking very closely at:

• activity bus costs
• strings program expansion
• custodial positions
• shortening the school year and
  
• full-day kindergarten.
  

Bergel and Godfrey are looking at limited smart board solutions.

Another interesting fact shown within is that by the end of this school year all schools will have at least one smart board.

Budget Day today, Budget Year tomorrow

Decision time. Thank you to everyone who has contributed your thoughts via email, the comments section, or in person. Please continue to give your thoughts during the day.

A year ago after the reconciliation, I put thoughts of the budget largely out of my mind until the Superintendent's recommendation came in November. This year will be very different. There are budget initiatives which need to be taken and proposals to be evaluated that cannot be done in the crunch of budget season, and must be done over the course of the next six months.

Like me, you can't forget about it until next year either. Whether you are an LCPS employee, a parent or a concerned citizen your voice is needed throughout the year as we prepare for the next budget. Advocate for your beliefs both to your School Board members and the Board of Supervisors throughout this year.

More Budget Information

Preparing for Monday evening's budget reconciliation session, School Board members have been asking a lot of budget questions. If you want a peek at where we're looking for cuts, what various members are likely to propose, look to see what questions they're asking:

Impact of Proposed Staff Reductions (43k) (or reductions in in the increase, if you prefer)

School Board Questions Part 1 (1-28) (17k)

School Board Questions Part 2 (29-40, 42-55, 57-60, 69-72, 73) (40k)

School Board Questions Part 3 (41, 56, 61-68, 73, 75) (34k)

These are all searchable. Some highlights:

• What is the approximate amount the current budget for books would be reduced if LCPS charged parents (assume means testing would dictate those who get free lunch would also qualify for free books)?


• What would be the savings if all core subjects were required to have at least 90% of the school board target class size?


• If we eliminated ALL in-service training this year, how much would be saved from the budget?


• If each family in LCPS were to pay a $50 "supply fee" at the beginning of the school year, how much money would that generate? Also show me the same at $75 per family? $100?


• If each student were to pay a fee for participation in sports once he/she makes the team, how much money could be generate?


• If we froze the library budget for one year - no new books and no aides hired - what would the financial savings be?

Cuts I'll Vote Against, New Cuts I'll Propose

Only two people showed up to provide input on the budget last night. I still can't figure out why the Supervisors get hundreds of speakers about school budgets and we get two, when we determine 75% of County spending. Where were all the people last night who are so angry that teachers might get any pay raise at all, that LCPS ever purchased a smart board, who demand that Dr. Hatrick take a pay cut? Where were all my blog commenters?

I have received a very few emails, no phone calls and had one really great meeting with 10 LCPS moms. I'm taking all of that input very seriously, because there are no opposing voices.

LCPS released additional information on the impact of the Superintendent's proposed cuts in his new personnel request yesterday, please read about them.

I do not support some of the Superintendent's recommendations for budget cuts.

• Educational Diagnostician ($90,523)
• Eligibility Coordinator ($109,842)
• Paid Holiday initiative for Classified employees ($685,000)
• Speech Therapist ($146,530)
• Social Worker ($90,523)
• Full day Kindergarten expansion, ($213,823)
• Data Analyst for Pupil Services ($71,244)

That means I'll need to find a total of $1.407,485 in additional savings. Here are some of my proposals:

• Digital Video Distribution System ($80,000)
• Expiring visitor badges ($64,600)
  
• Health & PE PDAs ($42,075)
• New scoreboard for Potomac Falls High School ($30,000)
• Promethean Smart Boards ($2,994,800)

I'm waiting to find out how much money is still intended for the Smart Boards, but With the feedback I've heard from citizens and supervisors alike regarding Smart Boards, it's clear that they do not have the support of the community and I will vote against purchasing more of them this year.

A Little Analysis of the Suggested Cuts

I spent time on Tuesday night crawling through the suggested cuts, here's what I found:

1. Class Sizes will increase across the county. The Superintendent says that this will result in mixed-grade classes at some schools.
2. Two thirds of the positions cut are teachers or teaching assistants
3. The cost of living increase was eliminated, cutting the requested pay increase in half
4. 50% of the cuts are salary cuts and elimination of teaching positions
5. 50% of new teachering positions planned for next year were cut
6. The average salary of a cut position is under $50K

I already have a list of changes I want to see to this proposal. I will wait until after tonight's public input session before finalizing that list, and I will write more about those in the coming days.

LCPS Budget: Final Stage for FY09

The Board of Supervisors had its final vote today, cutting $48.7M from the LCPS budget request. The state budget is $1M less than anticipated as well, so we have $49.7M in cuts to make.

Here's what happens next:

• Within the next two days the School Board expects to receive a recommendation for cuts from the Superintendent.
• Thursday April 3rd at 6:30pm the School Board will hold a public input session. Please come and speak to let us know where you think we can find budget savings. Please also send me your input via email.
• Monday, April 7th at 6:30pm the School Board will discuss and vote on the budget. Chairman DuPree's goal is to stay as long as it takes to reach a final decision.

You can download the Superintendent's recommended budget cuts here.

More Light, Less Heat

Dear PTA Presidents & Others:

When I wrote last week’s emails, I was fired up. I had come to the last few days of advocacy for the LCPS budget. I had discovered that many PTA leaders were not aware of the Supervisors budget proposals.

Many of you passed my emails along to your membership, which I had hoped you would do and appreciate. Many PTA members were grateful and responded by advocating to the Board of Supervisors. Others were upset about the PTA email lists being used for political purposes. Upon receiving responses from their reps on the Board of Supervisors, many parents became unsure about just who is responsible for the salaries of school employees.

I am concerned that in the desire to raise awareness and do all I could for our schools, I may have overstepped and done more to blur the situation than to clarify it. I am also concerned that I continued the “sky is falling” rhetoric of past budget years. I took the weekend to refocus and find perspective on the situation, and concluded that I need to add more light and less heat today.

1. The Board of Supervisors allocates funds; the School Board determines how they are spent. Therefore, within limitations it is the School Board who determines teacher salaries. The School Board may be able to offer staff a modest raise this year by cutting back on programs and staff levels. Doing this will require substantial cuts, and I don’t think it can be done without impacting the quality of our schools, but it is possible.
2. There are two kinds of salary increases for LCPS employees. One is a cost of living adjustment (COLA), the other is called a “step increase” and is essentially a raise for gaining another year of experience. The $10M I have been advocating for the past few days is for a “step increase” without a COLA.
3. The Board of Supervisors has fallen short of allocating funds equivalent to stable per-student funding plus a step increase for LCPS employees, a standard I had hoped they would meet.
4. PTA parents are not uniform in their feelings about school funding, class sizes, teacher salaries or tax rates. They are as politically diverse as our entire community.
5. My job as a School Board member is to ensure that Loudoun County has an effective and efficient school system and to advocate for what is best for that system.

I continue to ask that our Board of Supervisors allocate an additional $10M to the school budget to allow for stable per-pupil funding plus a step increase for our staff. I hope that through my emails you and your members have become better informed about the budget for the upcoming school year and that through your emails the Supervisors have become better informed about how strongly the Loudoun community feels about its schools. Nevertheless, I apologize for any adverse effects stemming from the information I have sent to you in the past week.

Penny for a Pay Raise: 4 Days Left

Download these budget facts and distribute.

The situation:

• The Loudoun County Board of Supervisors has voted to cut the School Board’s
• funding request by $49.8 Million.
• The adopted tax rate ($1.14) does not provide enough funds for LCPS to give even modest raises to its teachers, staff, custodians and other school employees.
• The supervisors did vote to give County employees a 3% raise.
• Three Supervisors (Buckley, McGimsey, Burk) have voted for a tax rate of $1.15, which will enable the schools to give a 3% step increase to all employees. It is a Penny for a Pay Raise.
• The final vote on the tax rate will be Tuesday morning, April 1st. Supervisors Buckley, McGimsey & Burk need your support to get the last Penny for a Pay Raise.
  

What you can do:

1. Write to the Board of Supervisors and ask them to support a Penny for a Pay Raise: BOS@Loudoun.gov
2. Join the rally at the County Government building in Leesburg on Monday March 31st at 5:30pm. Teachers, custodians, school staff of all kinds and the parents who support them must come and demand that the Board of Supervisors provide a Penny for a Pay Raise, ensuring that teachers and school employees will get a modest raise this year just like other County employees.
3. Thank Supervisors Buckley, McGimsey & Burk for their support of the Penny for a Pay Raise.
4. Let your child’s teachers know that you support the Penny for a Pay Raise.
5. Pass this along to the people you know who want to support our teachers and school employees.

Penny for a Pay Raise: 5 Days left

Last night the Board of Supervisors had a chance to give our teachers a pay raise. They failed. By a 5-4 vote, they approved a tax rate of $1.14, which provides the same number of dollars per student as the previous year's budget but falls $10 Million short of a pay raise for school employees. Adding insult to injury, the Supervisors at the same time voted a pay raise for County employees.

Please take a moment to thank Sugarland's Susan Buckley for standing strong for schools and teachers last night. She stood alone. I am particularly disappointed that Leesburg's Kelly Burk switched her vote after initially voting for the pay raise. I am further disappointed by Andrea McGimsey, who just last week joined Kelly Burk in voting for a tax rate a penny higher that would have funded teacher pay raises.

The fight is not over yet. The final budget vote is in five days.

Please write to Supervisors Andrea McGimsey and Kelly Burk and ask them to add a Penny for a Pay Raise next Tuesday when the final vote comes.

Supervisors Consider Operating Budget tonight

Last night's slog through the CIP, proffers and cross-dais put-downs got us through the CIP and passed a 10% reduction in the budget allocated for building schools in the future.

Tonight they will discuss the schools operating budget, and we know that the School Board request will be cut, but by how much is anybody's guess right now. Today may be your last chance to contact the Board of Supervisors and advocate. I'll be in the Board room again tonight to advocate to keep small class sizes, teacher pay raises, parity across the county and the needs of all of our students. I'll be liveblogging via Twitter again because... well, because I just can't keep my fingers still for that long.

Liveblogging the Supervisors

The School Board cut short its meeting tonight and is present at the Board of Supervisors budget discussion. Primarily they are discussing capital projects, which includes the cost of building schools in coming years. It is possible that they will begin motions on the LCPS operating budget tonight as well. I'll be liveblogging thoughts via Twitter.

Questions for Supervisors

Last week we met with the Board of Supervisors to answer more questions. Overall the tone was much, much better than two weeks prior. I especially thank Mr. Miller, Ms. Buckley and Ms. Kurtz for their helpful questions and remarks. Through it all I thought of some questions that I would ask the Board of Supervisors if they were sitting before our dais:

• When you are looking at School Budgets nationwide, are you aware that you are looking at the budgets of School Boards which set their own tax rates?
• Do you believe that class sizes affect student achievement?
• Do you believe that updated science textbooks affect student achievement?
• Do you believe that employee compensation is related to employee performance?
• Do you believe that lower per pupil cost relates to higher achievement?
• Do you believe that having good schools reduces the impact of an economic downturn?
• Do you believe that good schools enhance the resale values of the homes they serve?
• Do you believe that employee retention is considered to be a good thing?
• Do you believe that coming in under budget is a good thing?