WPS in Brief for June: Final FY24 Budget
and middle school sports, preschool expansion, administrative spending, school liaison officer update, facilities
Welcome to the sixth issue of WPS in Brief. This month covers key topics from two school committee meetings, two budget meetings, and four standing committee meetings. I always appreciate feedback or questions. You can email me at wpsinbrief@substack.com.
Let’s get to it:
The 2023-2024 School Year Budget (aka FY24).
The school committee approved a budget after about four hours of public deliberation over two meetings. For me, these budget meetings underscore how well the current school committee is functioning as a public body. They deliberate everything openly. They ask great questions, which not only holds the school department accountable, but provides valuable information to the public. They do disagree (a good chunk of the time, actually), but they work together well. They debate. They take action on items. It’s really heartening, especially in contrast to the Worcester City Council, which has no power to change the city’s budget. They are only permitted to approve or not approve a budget proposed by the city manager, in its entirety. It’s bonkers. Anyway, if you missed it, read my review of the proposed budget from last month to see where things started. Here’s what’s different in the final budget:
The superintendent’s team suggested a few adjustments to the budget between when it was published and when the school committee deliberated. Those changes that are:
four proposed focused instructional coaches are on hold until the Chief Equity Officer is hired.
they are not filling the role of Director of Climate and Culture and instead will hire four climate and culture assistants at the middle school level.
The school committee made changes with the intent of:
hiring two additional nurses, in order to have a full time nurse in every school building.
adding 20 paraprofessionals so that every kindergarten class will have one.
increasing the budget for student-based instructional materials from $75 to $100 per pupil.
The money for these changes was transferred from:
two integrated coach positions that the administration decided they were no longer going to hire.
ten proposed school-based clerical positions. The administration proposed 20 secretaries to “provide student attendance oversight to provide information to School Adjustment Counselors and school administrators” but after deliberation, the committee felt like having one at every school probably wasn’t necessary, so they approved ten.
one proposed communications position that the majority of the school committee did not think was needed. Administration proposed two new communications positions. Novick motioned to transfer the salaries of both (essentially eliminating both positions), but that motion failed, with everyone but Novick voting no. The motion to transfer the salary of just one position passed, with Mailman, Johnson, and Petty voting no.
$600,000 moved from transportation, because in-house transportation has saved the district money and there was a surplus. The transfer reflects realized savings.
$180,000 from the literacy tutors salary line.
How money is allocated is for sure the most important part of all this, but what I briefly touch on above gives a glimpse into the deliberation that was happening, which is important context (and sadly not something our local news covers). There was some solid deliberation on the clerical positions, on the communications position, on understanding facilities maintenance, and more than I could fit in this brief. (If you want to see more of what happened around deliberation for the non-salary accounts, check out my twitter thread here.) This level of deliberation shows me that the school committee is taking its responsibility seriously.
Some other tidbits of info that came up during the budget deliberations:
Middle School Sports.
Boys and girls flag football will be added to all the middle schools through the addition of 10 coaching positions. The Director of Athletics said they viewed middle school sports as feeders into the high school programs. It is unclear whether there are equivalent opportunities for boys and girls in football at the high school level.
Current Vacancies.
The chart below shows open positions by budget category.
Chief Financial Officer Brian Allen said there is a vacancy factor of about $6 million built into the budget.
Preschool.
The administration's “desired state” is to move to full day preschool across the district, but a significant challenge is facilities. They are adding two or three Specialized Approaches to Individual Learning (SAIL) preschool classrooms. And two of the Chandler Magnet preschool classrooms are moving to Clark Street and Elm Park.
SLO MOU Update.
Update on SLO MOU
Office of Academic Support.
Effective July 1st, school adjustment counselors will report to their building principals and school psychologists will report to the special education department. Psychologists will continue to report to their current supervisor, Dr. Gloria McKibbin. Here’s an updated organizational chart for the Office of Academic Support.
Administrative Spending.
The School Committee has a written policy that puts a spending cap on the administration at 1.5% of the foundation budget. For this current year's budget the district will “spend below the self-imposed administrative spending cap by more than $261,000.”
That’s all for the budget.
Here’s what else happened this month:
Lunch Time.
The administration is asking all elementary principals to schedule 20-minute lunches for elementary schools next year. Middle and high school lunch times will not change.
Sex Ed Opt Out.
As of June 8 there are 3554 students opted out of the sex ed curriculum. If using Oct 1st enrollment numbers, this represents approximately 14.6% of the student body. There was talk about ways to communicate with caregivers to keep them informed about the curriculum, both through a virtual information session and at Fall open houses at individual schools.
Magnet Schools.
The standing committee on Governance and Employee Issues approved a revised handbook (it is not official until it is approved by the full committee). As part of that process, administration clarified that Chandler Magnet, Jacob Hiatt Magnet, and Worcester Arts Magnet are the schools they still consider magnet schools. Norrback Avenue School and City View Discovery school were taken off the list.
New School Committee Student Advisory Representatives.
Congrats to the new School Committee Student Advisory Reps:
Facilities.
At this month’s meeting of the Standing Committee on Finance and Operations there was a big update on facilities projects. (It’s in alphabetical order by school if you are looking for something specific). There is a new Director, Richard Ikonen, and new assistant director, Ryan Hacker, both of whom started in May, and I just want to publicly thank them for taking on this cluster of a job. If you have been reading this newsletter for the short six months of its existence, you have probably picked up by now that deferred maintenance has created some serious facilities challenges. For example, six years ago a facilities assessment recommended that 22 (out of 60) buildings be replaced or receive major renovations and the estimated cost was $70 million at the time. We are trying to dig out of a very big hole and need some serious leadership and collaboration of municipal and state folks to tackle this. Which leads us to….
Meeting Moment to Watch
At this City Council finance meeting the superintendent framed the current facilities predicament in an understandable way (she is an educator after all.) It’s six minutes and worth a listen if you want to have a better grasp of the situation.
Recommended Reads.
Word is that the new teacher’s contracts are some of the best any Massachusetts district has seen in a while. Read the details here.
Congratulations to the class of 2023! Read about the valedictorians at each school.
Learn about student gardening programs put on by REC Worcester.
Op-Ed From Representative Keefe about Worcester School buildings
From a fellow WPS parent, Kevin Koczwara, on what it’s like to send our kids to schools in the age of school shootings. I keep waiting for it to happen to us. (scroll down to find it).
School Committee Member Sue Mailman talks about pay equity and school committee salary.
Not Worcester specific, but this is a good read about why Massachusetts suburbs get funding for new schools over districts in higher need, like New Bedford (and Worcester)
Here is the final list of who is running for school committee. More on that soon!
The superintendent reflects on her first year.
Upcoming Dates.
All meetings have virtual options, see the school committee site for more information.
School Committee Meetings June 30, 8am and July 20, 4pm
Also.
Consider donating to some Worcester teachers to fund their projects now, so they can get supplies in time for the start of the school year. Help a first year Belmont Street teacher get classroom materials, a Chandler Elementary teacher replace her cracked white board, and donate to provide pencils and games for indoor recess for students at Rice Square. Or check out all the Worcester projects and find one to support.
Happy summer vacation! If you find WPS in Brief valuable, please share it with your friends. If you’d like to support my work, be the first to send me a tip. See you in July.