I'm not worried that much about the budget... I'd just like to see less government and initiation of force in our society... especially in areas that could so easily be privately run, like athletics.
I'm not sure where you are disagreeing with me. I understand where the money goes. Do schools and districts need extremely high salaried administrators? Does each school need a Principal and vice principal? Some with several vice principals??? Why can school employees be on a similar retirement as the private sector?
In the end, people are tired of the bloated school administrations, teachers and administrators that are next to impossible to fire when they really stupid chit, being asked for increased taxes "it's for the children" to cover the costs of increasing salaries and benefits and then when school starts the teachers sending home a "wish list" of items the teacher would like the parents to contribute to the classroom. If you were the "money guy" for the district I surprised you don't get it. Or am I?
Your original statement was "70-80% of budgets go to administrators salaries" Then in the above statement you said administrators and teachers. That was more of my point the percentage is for ALL employees, teachers, custodians, administrators, maintenance personnel bus drivers, cooks, etc. not just administrators.
In this state if a district's total administrative cost for salaries is above 8% that school gets a gig on its state report. If that persists the regional accreditation officer will sit down with the supt and ask for a plan to reduce it. I do get it now does this help you understand better?
My additional comments would be in the area of expenditure by the state on a per pupil basis. Oklahoma has cut theirs 22% in the last 4 yrs. West Virginia, a state with very similar demographics, spends almost double what we do here in Oklahoma. I need help understanding that before I will ever support cutting educators pay when the state puts soooooooooooooooo little value in the cost of providing for education here. Oh and our esteemed legislators pay ranks in the top 25% nationwide.
My statement was administrative costs and then I explained in the what I meant by those costs. In the end we are probably on the same page. I wouldn't have as much problem with paying people what their worth and do believe in higher than average salaries for teachers, however, teachers and top administrators need to be paid base on student performance. Teachers need to be graded and the bad ones fired. Tenure would be gone and the bad teachers out. Just like the private sector.
Yeah, where does THAT money go????
Education. Lottery brings in a profit of 70 million a year.
The education budget for k-12 was 52.4 million in 2013, this is for salaries, retirement, and benefits. The state has to get to the 52.4 million somehow, they use the lottery to get to that number. The problem is, even if the lottery brought in 100 million, k-12 isn't going to get a scent more than 52.4 million. We haven't seen a large increase in education spending since the lottery began, but did anyone really expect it.
What I saw from inside the education system is why I quit working there. Funds from one account being used for something unrelated. State audits that found the same offenses over and over again, with some recommending that the matter be taken up by the DA's office, but zero follow-through.
Actually, they aren't. Local papers use the unpublished compensation packages as leverage on a regular basis. Sure, it's public record, but they are not all available online.
Keep in mind that the "state budget" is only for ~40% of actual state expenditures. The legislature only budgets for the taxes that are assigned to general appropriations (i.e. income tax, sales tax, and relatively few other taxes). If it's an earmarked tax or an agency-imposed fee, it is not included in the official state budget.
Better link: http://www.ocpathink.org/articles/2663
http://www.oscn.net/applications/oscn/deliverdocument.asp?id=441369
45% to K-12
45% to Higher Education (colleges, CareerTech)
5% to School Consolidation and Assistance Fund
5% to Teachers' Retirement
There is no cap in place.
Of the higher education portion, colleges see ~90% to fund tuition, student loans, and scholarships. Keep in mind that, even with this, Oklahoma colleges have each year for the past several years generated record revenues while seeing increases in the state budget and citing state budget deficiencies as justification for higher tuition.
Your statement about how "$52.4M" is dead wrong. The education budget for education for FY2013 was $3.4B, with $2.3B being K-12. Actual spending by the State Department of Education was $4.4B. $70M was transferred to the education fund by the lottery, meaning $31.5M went to K-12, $28M went to colleges, $3.5M to CareerTech, $3.5M to Teachers' Retirement, $3.5M to School Cons/Asst Fund, after a $500K earmark for Mental Health. http://www.sai.ok.gov/Search Reports/database/cafr13.pdf
Education saw at 2% increase in 2013 and a 4% increase in 2014 from the "state budget". Bottom-line actual education spending (the $4.4B) increased 0.3%.
By the way... does increasing spending in education actually help performance?
http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/state-education-trends#/OK
There are two places where money gets thrown whether or not it helps: education and law enforcement. Both say "we're not seeing results, therefore we need more money" and (very rarely) "we're seeing results, therefore we need more money".
I can tell you unequivocally that although your figures tell one story every district in this state has cut its budget because of less allocation of funds from the state dept of ed in the last 4 yrs. I would bet I know more supts than you. Not a single one has received an increase in their allocation. Now that said, what the state is doing with this money is quite another story. Our state supt has gone wild with the testing mandate SHE invoked. That cost has been bore by her and the dept. The contract for this testing was a buttload of money. [B]The money is just not getting to the districts from that office plan and simple
Districts have been using carryover to preserve simple everyday operations. However cuts in reoccurring costs has been the norm. Maybe you can find this money but 500 supts in this state have been unable up to now.
Why not consider reducing state funding in Vo-tech and higher ed. Vo tech spends $9000/ pupil and limits who can attend their programs. Common ed spends 1/2 that and has NO option to limit who they educate? Higher ed can and does receive large ammounts of money from the public and private sector for endowments, and special projects. Public education is almost shout out of that sector of funding and again higher ed limits who can attend while common educates educates everyone and cannot limit who they educate.
Similar threads
