Schools Confront Economic Realities

The reductions in state aid to many school districts nationwide are taking a huge toll. The additional disappearance of Federal Stimulus Funds coupled with the end of the Education Jobs funding have created a “perfect storm” scenario for schools across America. The American Association of School Administrators has been following these trends for the past year and predicts that there is no immediate relief in sight for the educational portion of state budgets.



Reductions continue to put a strain on schools coping with reductions in personnel, activities, and services. The fear is that given the current state of the economy many school districts will continue to experience shortfalls from state contributions. This trend began in 2007 and is likely to continue well into the next few school years.



While many school districts are struggling to do more with less, several are beginning to confront the notion that they will have to do less with less (funding). The idea of cutting personnel, activities, and programs is a painful reality for school boards across the country. Philosophically speaking, most school board members would rather cut off an appendage rather than cut school programs. Not one of the Hopatcong School Board members wanted to cut academic programs, personnel, sports, activities, or other educational opportunities for children this past year during the budget development process.



Last year was particularly painful for a small district like Hopatcong, N.J. (2,200 students). A loss of 2.4 million dollars in state and local funding resulted in twenty-four less personnel to serve the needs of our tiny school district. This school year was less of a problem due to increased federal support mostly in the form of Education Jobs funding and ARRA funding. Both sources of federal dollars will be non-existent in the next budget cycle and further cuts may be in store for us.



Schools like Hopatcong, N.J., and others across the country are feeling the results of cuts at all levels. Typical cuts in personnel have reduced teacher to pupil rations resulting in much larger than desired class sizes across the overall spectrum. Additional cost saving measures include a reduction in activities and athletic programs, after-school programs, gifted programs, field trips, and certain salary freeze measures nationwide. A recent survey led by AASA concluded that 65% of superintendents said they eliminated jobs in 2010-2011, with almost three-quarters reporting that they will do the same during the coming school year.



The difficult times ahead for public education are certain to be correlated with the recession and economic conditions. With little relief in sight school superintendents and school boards will continue to struggle with undesirable and uncomfortable cuts to personnel and programs. It is hard to see the “light at the end of the tunnel” from a funding perspective and this is one of those moments in time no one wants to have to endure for very long.