April 7, 2010
Serious problems with some school districts’ special-education programs have gone unnoticed because of weak state oversight, a new federal audit says. The U.S. Department of Education visited in October to test how well the state Department of Education keeps tabs on schools’ special-needs practices. Federal reviewers found that some of the school districts they spot-checked […]
April 7, 2010
Public schools have not only escaped budget cuts the past few years, they have actually received budget increases. That likely will end. Members of the House Education Appropriations Committee initially put a $105 million increase in the school funding formula, enough to keep up with the new formula’s seven-year phase-in. The full House Budget Committee […]
April 7, 2010
Voters in two central Wisconsin school districts will decide today whether to maintain class sizes and keep existing extracurricular activities. The Stevens Point area school distric t is asking its voters to replace an $8 million dollar referendum that expires this summer with a two-year $7.1 million dollar referendum. The referendum would help fund eight […]
April 7, 2010
Olathe School Board members know that a lot of unpleasant budget decisions lie ahead but they also know that teachers are supporting them. Teachers filled the board room Thursday night to listen to Superintendent Pat All tell board members they must fill a projected $12 million deficit in next year’s school budget. <p class="loose" style="margin: […]
April 7, 2010
They don’t vote, they aren’t campaign contributors and when the doors close on final budget negotiations, they tend to drop off the radar. Children dominate almost every speech in the Legislature, but advocates for the programs that sustain them are bracing for one of the worst years in decades as lawmakers wrestle with a $3.2 […]
April 7, 2010
Loudoun County officials approved a $1.4 billion annual budget Tuesday that includes a property tax increase and a 2.5 percent cut in school system funding. The county Board of Supervisors adopted a tax rate of $1.30 per $100 of assessed value, a 4.4 percent increase over this year’s rate. Ben Mays, deputy chief financial officer […]
April 7, 2010
A bill to withhold state funding from school districts with fund balances exceeding 15 percent of their operating budget would penalize those districts that are "hoarding" state funding, said its sponsor, state Rep. Tim Melton, D-Auburn Hills. Livingston County districts would be spared because none have fund balances of that size. But one local superintendent […]
April 7, 2010
Mississippi’s Medicaid program still hasn’t received federal permission to cut payments to doctors, dentists and other providers for the final three months of the budget year, the program’s spokesman said Monday. The chairman of the state Senate Public Health Committee, meanwhile, said the planned cuts for April, May and June are counterproductive. "It just further […]
April 5, 2010
While Minnesota’s education leaders tut-tut and point fingers about the failure to win Race to the Top grant money, the inexorable deterioration of our state’s education system continues. This was very evident in Tuesday’s editions of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, which featured two stories about education. One was about why the state missed out on […]
April 5, 2010
At a Daniel Boone Area School board budget workshop, the board looked at making some painful cuts to close a $1.56 million budget shortfall in the preliminary 2010-11 budget. Among those items considered for the chopping block at last Wednesday’s meeting were the elimination of the entire elementary band program and three middle school teachers […]