Tuesday, February 14, 2006
District 300 Capitulates on Low-Balling State Aid Projections by $3.3 Million
Last night, District 300’s adminstration admitted it was wrong in grossly underestimating State Aid to Education for next year. (Those weren’t the exact words.)
A person at the meeting said the state aid glass is now $3.3 million fuller ($2.3 from general state aid, plus $1 million more for the charter school). Before, they admitted to 30% of the expected general state aid increase and nothing from charter school subsidies.
As pointed out in McHenry County Blog last Wednesday, there’s enough extra state aid to pay for extracurricular activities and sports.
Funny, that’s about the same figure that Huntley School District 158 Board member Larry Snow said District 300’s projection was short in his talk last week to the Algonquin Rotary Club. At the time, District 300’s finance woman Cheryl Crates admitted her State Aid to Education figure was low.
Snow also criticized District 300’s failure to account for future charter school savings.
Here’s Crate’s comment about that in the Daily Herald today:
A person at the meeting said the state aid glass is now $3.3 million fuller ($2.3 from general state aid, plus $1 million more for the charter school). Before, they admitted to 30% of the expected general state aid increase and nothing from charter school subsidies.
As pointed out in McHenry County Blog last Wednesday, there’s enough extra state aid to pay for extracurricular activities and sports.
Funny, that’s about the same figure that Huntley School District 158 Board member Larry Snow said District 300’s projection was short in his talk last week to the Algonquin Rotary Club. At the time, District 300’s finance woman Cheryl Crates admitted her State Aid to Education figure was low.
Snow also criticized District 300’s failure to account for future charter school savings.
Here’s Crate’s comment about that in the Daily Herald today:
For the sake of being chastised for not including it, we’ve included it at this time.But the district hasn’t decided to tell the whole truth on this issue yet, as can be seen by the last two paragraphs of the Daily Herald article by Jeffrey Gaunt:
But district officials said they can’t yet predict how many fewer teachers the district would need if the charter school is operating by the fall.Perhaps addition transparency would be in order. If District can predict how many more teachers will be needed if there are more students, why can’t it predict how many fewer teachers will be needed if there are fewer students?
By adding the charter school in projections, the district’s financial situation is made to appear worse than if the school doesn’t open.
Comments:
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I do not know how anyone can read your BLOGs about District 300 and vote yes on the referenda. Keep up the great work Cal.
I wish every school district had a Cal Skinner doing such great investigative work. We would not have another referenda pass in Illinois.
Let us hope every parent and taxpayer is reading your BLOG.
I wish every school district had a Cal Skinner doing such great investigative work. We would not have another referenda pass in Illinois.
Let us hope every parent and taxpayer is reading your BLOG.
Damn straight!!!!! Keep up the good work! I unfortunately am selling my home because Im sick and tired of this beg and spend crap that Disgrace 300 seems to have to have every single year!
I make a good wage to survive but im not one of the 15%+ raises every year teachers. I obviously picked the wrong career field! Im still here in D300 long enough to vote NO! Keep up the good work we will win the war!
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I make a good wage to survive but im not one of the 15%+ raises every year teachers. I obviously picked the wrong career field! Im still here in D300 long enough to vote NO! Keep up the good work we will win the war!
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