A Guide To The School Budget

To the Editor:

I would like to introduce to the readers of The Bee, A Citizen’s Guide to the Budget Development Process. This Newtown Education Budget Guide was seven months in the making. It was a pleasure working with Kinga Walsh, Alisa Farley, Robin Fitzgerald and Cathy Reiss to bring together this Education Budget Guide. The link to the guide is https://sites.google.com/site/newtownedbudgetguide.

This is our best effort at an unbiased and comprehensive overview of the processes and considerations used to prepare the education budget and it mirrors efforts already published by Trumbull, Milford and Canton, to name a few. We have scrupulously researched every data point, every chart, every word, in an attempt to bring you the most accurate information possible.

At over 100 pages, it is a bit to digest in one sitting, which is why we divide the Newtown Education Guide into 15 easily digestible parts.

Understanding how Newtown’s committees build our budget every year is a daunting task, which is why we start with section 4 “Newtown Budget Considerations.” Here you will find a wonderful graphic of all of the considerations which go into our education budget.

Within Section 5, we show the timelines and flow charts of how and who is involved in the decision-making process. These show the interaction between the Board of Education, Board of Selectmen, Legislative Council, Board of Finance and us, the voters.

After this discussion of the “decision tree,” the processes and considerations of our education budget, we introduce in Section 6 the “Policies, Plans and Goals of the Town and School District” as established by the Board of Selectmen and Board of Education.

Section 7 and 8 describe the funding inputs (federal, state, local) and the outflows from the education budget. The guide shows the rate of change in total education budget expenditures and costs per pupil and the percent change from year to year. It compares expenditures and costs per pupil with student enrollment and the rate of inflation.

Section 9 provides a historical overview of past Newtown education budgets and its effect on staff changes, program cuts, along with changes in instructional hours since 2003.

Section 10 describes the external forces which affect our budget. These forces include lists of partially funded and unfunded state and federal mandates, “No Child Left Behind,” Special Education and Common Core Standards. These areas have a significant impact on our budget. Currently, there are over 145 mandates which affect Connecticut schools. This guide lists them all for you to see.

Section 11 introduces us to our District Regional Group. It describes what a DRG is and how Newtown compares with other towns within our DRG based on costs per pupil, CMT scores, graduation rates and kindergarten enrollment.

With this guide, we hope you will get involved and make a difference. We have asked the Board of Education to allow us to formally present this guide at the next BOE meeting. We hope you will attend.

Charles Hepp

4 Winter Ridge Road, Sandy Hook                        February 29, 2012

(Editor’s note: A story on the Citizen’s Guide to the Budget Development Process [“Guide to the School Budget Process Created] appeared in the 2/24/12 edition of The Bee.)