News Articles

Published: February 19, 2007
By Elizabeth Martin
Staff Writer

Group: Put more focus on classes
Say 65 percent of budget should go to classroom

One Vermont teacher is on a crusade to have supervisory unions and districts statewide focus more on classroom spending and less on overhead costs. His goal aims at schools spending no less than 65 percent of their budgets directly on classroom costs.

"What we have now is school districts that keep spending until there is a taxpayer revolt," said Curtis Hier, who teaches in Fair Haven, Vt., and is chairman of First Class Education for Vermont, which is part of the national organization.

"I believe in a lot of schools you can look at the support services and they shouldn't be sacred, the classrooms should be sacred," Hier said.

Hier encourages schools currently below the 65 percent level for classroom spending to examine their costs and cut overhead. Classroom spending includes supplies, materials, benefits and teacher's salaries. Figures the watchdog group scrutinizes are from the operating budgets and do not include capital improvement costs.

The group's advisory board, which includes state senators, retired and current teachers and a former state tax commissioner, looks at the 58 supervisory unions and districts statewide. It learned that five are above the recommended 65 percent.

Locally, schools are below Hier's benchmark figure.

• The Springfield School District is at 57.84 percent. It includes Elm Hill School, Park Street School, Riverside School, Springfield High School and Union School.
• The Windsor Southeast Supervisory Union stands at 60.11 percent. Schools include Cavendish Town Elementary School, Green Mountain Union High School, Chester-Andover Elementary School and Flood Brook Union School.
• Windsor Southwest Supervisory Union spends 59.13 percent for classrooms. The union includes Hartland Elementary School, Weathersfield Elementary School, Weathersfield Middle School, Windsor High School and Windsor State Street School.
• Windham Northwest Supervisory Union has the highest direct classroom spending at 63 percent, but it was 67.47 percent in 2004. The union includes Central Elementary School, Saxtons River Elementary School, Bellows Falls Union High School, Westminster Center School, Westminster West Elementary, Grafton Elementary and Bellows Falls Middle School.

"I think our central office is pretty minimal. Somebody has to do payroll," Laura Ryan, vice chair of the Springfield School Board, said. "There are some things that absolutely have to be done."

Springfield School District business manager Steve Hier, no relation to Curtis, said the administrative costs for the district are relatively low. The current annual salary for Superintendent Rose Rooth is $88,691, but if approved,the salary for the 2007-08 school year would be $105,000. Rooth is leaving and a new superintendent will be hired this spring.

"It's not that we are spending 57 percent on the kids and 43 percent on administrative salary, it's more complicated than that," Steve Hier said.

He pointed out that some of the noninstruction costs include administrative, librarian, student support, transportation and food service. Teacher in-service programs are also funded under the central office budget.

Hier sees three ways to get Springfield to the 65 percent for classroom spending: Increase the budget, decrease support services or look at items coded as noninstructional but could be considered instructional. Field trips are coded under transportation, but could be considered instructional, he said.

"I don't know that 65 percent is the magic number," the business manager said. "It's always one of the prime questions that we're trying to answer, is what we're proposing best for kids," Hier said.

For more information about First Class Education for Vermont, visit www.fcevt.com.

Elizabeth Martin can be reached at emartin@eagletimes.com or (603) 543-3100, ext. 103.