Worcester Public Schools' enrollment changes: it's complicated

Today's Telegram and Gazette front page headline: "Worcester school enrollment sees biggest decline in 12 years"

...sigh...

Let's first acknowledge that the main reason this matters in Worcester is that Worcester is a foundation funded district: the district is funded at just above foundation (if that; I expect we fell below it this year), so enrollment changes and inflation = budget changes. Period. Scott O'Connell knows this from covering Worcester, thus the article.
And it will matter that, as Mr. Allen notes:

Specifically, Allen said, the district would be starting off with a net decline of $3.7 million because of the drop in enrollment.

But the headline, and even the article, miss the story of the Worcester Public Schools and enrollment.
Yes, a difference of 371 students to this year from last year is the biggest single year drop since 2008.
It is not, however, the biggest single year change--the district gained 432 students from 2015-16 to 2016-17, for example--nor is the enrollment in the school district dropping year over year over time.

Here's the previous ten years of district enrollment:

FY20 WPS budget, p. 410. Yes, there is a typo in the year.

To give a little more perspective on this, here's a chart that goes farther back from the FY15 budget:

Yes, I am being lazy and taking a picture of the page; it's p. 334 in the budget book.

As Jack Foley noted Thursday night when we were discussing the air quality report on Columbus Park, Worcester closed eight schools in the early 2000's. As you can see in the above chart, the district hit the lowest point in 2007-08, but has climbed back up above the levels at which the schools were closed.
So now we have over 25,000 students in eight fewer buildings.
Nelson Place was built for larger enrollment (in part due to special education), but that only takes on so much.
We were told Thursday night that about half of our schools have classrooms that are in basement spaces.
Also, there are eight classrooms of Chandler Elementary that have classes at the Main Street Y; they aren't even in the building.

And we haven't been talking about this.

On Thursday, the School Committee recommitted the Facilities Master Plan to the Finance and Operations subcommittee and asked that updating it--it only includes schools build prior to 1990, as those would be possible for MSBA renovation and rebuild--be considered as part of the upcoming budget.

We really have to talk about the lack of space, the lack of updates, the lack of funding for regular work on buildings, for our schools. New high schools are great and are needed, but a new South and a new Doherty takes care of 11% of our students.

It is also crucial that we put district enrollment changes in context. This isn't some huge drop of students; this isn't large numbers of students moving out; this is how it nets out over a large number of schools.

I will add, though, that there is one thing that raises a question in my mind, having now run the school by school changes: what happened in Head Start? Why the drop from 551 to 393?
School by school changes (from the 2019-20 and 2018-29 district profile pages) after the jump:

Finance and Operations: closing FY15

Allen: final report of fiscal year
not much of a change from third quarter
use adopted budget in relation to actual expenditures
$82,000 out of a $200M salary spending
net positives are mostly vacancies; net negatives mostly overtime due to snow
health insurance savings due to senior plans not increases as much as others
freezes during the year to balance accounts
$69 going back to the city for free cash
millions of dollars still outstanding (include encumberances for summer salaries) when fiscal close

Finance and Operations meets at 5:30 today

The Finance and Operations subcommittee meets at 5:00 today at the Durkin Administration Building (4th floor). You can find the agenda here.
I've already posted on the big item on for consideration: the Community Eligibility Provision, which would mean universal free breakfast and lunch. Note that much the backup for this item is directed at the other impacts of the state changing how we measure child poverty. That's a big important discussion (which I don't think will end tonight!).
We also have a report back on the energy management contract (and how doing it in house is saving us money).
We have the close of FY15. This year, $69 going to city free cash.
We have the auditor for student activities accounts coming in.
We have what I assume will be our first consideration of the preliminary Foundation Budget Review Commission report. 
We also have a report I asked for our school plant staffing levels: it appears we have less than half the number of people recommended.

Finance and Operations meets August 18

Just posted today: we have a Finance and Operations subcommittee meeting on Tuesday, August 18 at 5 pm in the 4th floor conference room at DAB.
On the agenda (at least): the close of FY15 (!) and the consideration of universal free lunch.
(This will then report out at our August 20th meeting.)

Finance and Operations: third quarter

Report is here
Allen: reflects a lot of the conversation we've had in previous quarters
projected balance has improved
drivers still extraordinary winter (and overtime), 9C cuts, and workers comp "again continues to be" greater than budgeted (even as more was included this year)
custodial overtime, balanced by projected balance in custodial salaries
"typical things that we would see at this point in the year"
transfers to process payments
Ramirez: day-to-day subs "seems high"
Allen: one of the accounts that we've traditionally underfunded, deficit "fairly typical"
Novick: overtime for weather has gone up since second quarter
removal of snow on weekends at overtime rate (during March)
Novick: building utilties up still more?
Allen: above projected, should be borne out for the rest of the year
Novick: unfrozen funds for PD, IT, curriculum supplies
Allen: balance bears out ability to thaw funds
does not impact frozen student supplies
Ramirez: additional funds for weather?
Allen: FEMA didn't funds as much as requested, meeting with city CFO later this month, will discuss
Foley: would love to see FEMA money targeted funded for materials
workers comp get closer
"especially instructional materials"
should see less in unemployment this year (due to fewer layoffs)
Allen: will see increase in instructional materials account, but will be largely for textbooks for math
Foley: "we'll keep pushing for paper"

Finance and Operations meets Thursday

We're having a rare midday F&O meeting to squeeze in the third quarter report and school lunch changes necessary. Thus, two items on the agenda:

• third quarter budget report: big news here, I'd say, is that the freeze of the four accounts we're using to save the IA positions that we'd lose due to the midyear Quality Kindergarden grants is somewhat lessened: staff development, technology, and curriculum supplies are all now frozen at $20,000, while environmnental management remains frozen at $50,000. You'll see that there are three budget transfers recommended.
• school lunchh prices for next year: we are federal required to gradually raise our charged school lunch price to eventually reach the price we are federally reimbursed for each free lunch (you can see how this gets calculated on the attached report). That means that we're going to have to raise full price lunch next year to $1.80.

Worcester School Committee meets Thursday

The Worcester School Committee meets Thursday; you can find the agenda here.

The report of the Superintendent is an update on North High's safety plan. I suspect that the three items Ms. Ramirez has submitted on North--requesting a mediation specialist and creating a stakeholder group as well as asking about cameras--will be taken at the same time, as well as any testimony related to that.

Finance and Operations is reporting back; notes on auditors' reports, on the second quarter (including transfers), on facilities, on transportation. They'll be three votes on this beyond accepting the report: quarterly transfers, the bus contract, and MSBA submissions.

We have some new appointments (including a librarian!).
We have a reponse back from administration on bringing the energy management back in house. Short version? It's saving us money and giving us better service.
We have a response back from administration regarding the use of WRTA bus passes.
We have a number of congratulations coming through: dancers, artists, writers, good citizens!
In honor of Sunshine Week, I'm asking the City Solicitor to give us a legal opinion on the use of personal email for public business.
Mr. O'Connell is asking about some classifications he says were stricken from SAGE on student suspension.
Mr. Monfredo is starting his annual book drive for "Worcester: The City that Reads." Collection locations to come!
In relation to articles like this, I'm asking that administration clarify the use of student information in online apps.
Mr. O'Connell is asking to review both the Elm Park report from the state (which went to the stakeholder group for them to do their work on the already-approved Level 4 turnaround plan) and the Jacob Hiatt extended learning time report.
He is further asking around opting out of PARCC.
I'm requesting an update from administration on MCAS and PARCC.
Miss Biancheria is asking the role of the chief academic officer in school suspensions.
She's further asking for the difference between an internal document and a public document.
She's also asking about summer programs.

We have no executive session tomorrow night, so starting right with regular public session at 7!

Second quarter report

projected deficit of $221,110
have spent more than half a million on snow removal
have submitted for two storms $193,839 to FEMA for possible 75% (and reimbursement is not calculated in at this time)

state budget reductions: biggest impact on this report is Quality Kindergarten grant: equivalent of 15 IAs
all other reductions are elimination of services; Admin does not have a funding recommendation at this time

personnel services in deficit: transition in special ed services being brought in house over time (didn't happen right away)
If Quality K weren't cut, two would have offset each other.

Unemployment, workers comp
increase in out-of-town special education and McKinney-Vento

Balances in teachers (vacancy and attrition) custodial salaries (deficit in overtime)
retiree health insurance plan kicked in in January (so balance)

projected deficit has held two quarters; usually there is a change
need to take action now

$50,000 freeze EACH in technology, staff development, environmental management, curriculum supplies
second year in a row that schools don't get $10/pupil that is frozen at the beginning of the year; would usually be released now

Foley: sobering report; 9C cuts coming halfway through the year
two school based administrators on sick leave; need fill in
custodians on workers comp: issue? Martin working to reduce the numbers on workers' comp
looking at equipment being used, light duties for bringing people back, "not one particular issue"
Foley: is it snow removal? Martin: nothing long term
weather related costs: hoping we can get back from the fed; chances? hard to tell
difference from other year? Third party services for plowing and removing snow from roofs
number of storms: regular and overtime; much of it during regular hours
Foley: if school is closed and custodian comes in...? regular salary, unless day is extended

Ramirez: items frozen: what is environmental management?
Allen: agreement with DoJ and DEP, work continuing in future
safe managment of chemicals and the like
"because we've reached compliance, on a one time basis, we think we can freeze funds to address this"

Novick: praise facilities for their work over the winter and snow
did we see any damage from snow? Yes, on some roofs, repairing as we go
saving $12/ton on trash removal
request for Friday letter reporting on impact of freeze on technology, staff development, and student supplies
Not comfortable with freeze of student supplies; share that information with parents so at least they know why
transfers pass

Meetings and events next week

Lots of meetings of note next week!

• On Monday night at 6pm, we have the quarterly meeting of the Finance and Operations subcommittee. You can find that agenda (just posted) here. On it is our quarterly finance update and transfers as required. This is where the FY15 budget cuts hits the WPS budget, so this isn't going to be pretty. We also have the MSBA statements of interest for this year. That also includes an updated facilities report, per Ms. Biancheria's request. We also have the various auditors coming in. And we're considering the transportation bids.  Lots of important stuff there; that meeting is at the Durkin Administration Building, 4th floor.
• On Tuesday night, the Worcester Public Schools Fine and Performing Arts Departments host their annual "Meet the Artist" night at the spring festival of the arts at the Worcester Public Library downtown. That starts at 5:30pm.
• On Wednesday night at 7pm, CPPAC is holding their monthly meeting. This month it's at Chandler Magnet School on Chandler Street (across from Worcester State). The presentation this month is on the FY16 budget with a presentation something like this one by Mr. Allen. This is your chance to come and ask questions (per request, another post to follow on what we know so far);  I would really urge people to attend this.
• On Thursday night at 7pm, the Worcester School Committee meets at City Hall. The agenda on that will be posted tomorrow afternoon. 
• On Friday morning, the Worcester School Committee is hosting a Legislative Breakfast with our delegation; as it will be a quorum of the School Committee deliberating matters under our purview, it is a posted public meeting. That's at 9 am in the Harrington Room at Worcester Tech.

About those budget cuts

I quickly posted the chart with a link to the memo on Friday (as I was writing my testimony for yesterday). In total, the cuts are $495,602 for the Worcester Public Schools. A few notes:

• You may remember that back when these budget cuts were first announced, the Baker administration denied to T&G reporter Brad Petrishen that there would be any impact on Head Start. That surprised us. It also wasn't true: Our Head Start supplemental grant is getting a $51,030 cut. Also, see MassLive on this.
• While we're talking about early childhood, the $47,500 cut in the Community Family and Community Engagement grant cuts an early literacy coordinator. The push on third grade reading? The push on early childhood education? Nope. Cut.
• The biggest hit--and still in early childhood--is to the Quality Kindergarten Grant. That cut of $206,620 is the equivalent of 15 kindergarten instructional assistants for the rest of the year. This one you'll see turn up in our March 16 F&O meeting for the second quarter report. There's no magic answer on this one, 'though I don't think you'll see a recommendation that we cut IA's in March, either.
• The work we're doing on improving the graduation rate? Cuts of the entire Summer College-Community Connection program ($99,587), the MCAS Summer camp ($55,365), the Collaboratieve Partnership for Student Success ($21,859), and nearly the whole College and Career Readiness program (we're left with $2628) are not going to help that at all.
• Finally, we hear talk of innovative education, but even the innovation schools grant took a hit ($3128).

I get that the budget needs to be balanced, but every single one of these cuts is pennywise and pound foolish. You're creating expenses later with every single one of these cuts. 

Mid year budget cuts. Half a million dollars

In one chart

More to come on this. The full memo is posted here.

Upcoming Finance and Operations subcommittee

Now posted: Finance and Operations subcommittee meeting on Monday, March 16 at 6 pm in the 4th floor conference room at DAB.
The agenda isn't out yet, but it will definitely be the 2nd quarter report (which will be hits from both the Governor's budget cuts and the SNOW) and (possibly?) the school calendar for 2016 and beyond. Mark your calendar if those are of interest!

Reville "best way to get attendance at a school committee meeting is to threaten to change the school day and year" #MaEdu
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 26, 2015

WPS wins Meritorious Budget AGAIN!

Looking for some good news this Friday the 13th?
The Worcester Public Schools, for the second year in a row, has won the Association of School Business Officials' Meritorious Budget award! Thus, basically, this is the people who do budgets saying, "good job!" Or:

By working through the MBA Criteria Checklist, you will discover best practices in budgeting that will improve your budget's accuracy and transparency—building your stakeholders' confidence in your district's finance office.

The MBA Criteria Checklist provides a foundation for developing a reader-friendly budget document that:

Presents clear budget guidelines.

Promotes communication between departments and the community.

Encourages short- and long-range budget goals.

Supports effective use of educational resources.

Nice work by Mr. Allen, Ms. Consalvo, and all those who wrangle decimals and crunch numbers!

Governor Baker's FY15 budget cuts: Worcester Public Schools impact (round one)

Well, we knew it was coming.
We had the statewide numbers on Tuesday (see here and here). We've now got a first look at what it's going to mean for the Worcester Public Schools with a memo last night from administration.
And it's not good. In brief:

• While the circuit breaker has been cut, it's being cut from the DESE side, rather than the district side, so we won't be hit on that.
• Charter school reimbursement, which is already only at 60% of the reimbursement amount, down to 55% of the reimbursement amount.It's not clear how this will work district by district, but it's going to hit Worcester education spending ('though not the WPS).
• Assuming the cut to kindergarten grants hits ours, $212,000 lost of the funds for IAs in kindergarten. That's equivalent to 17 (of 63). Note: do I see us cutting those positions now? No. But I don't know where it's going to come from, either.
• Head Start supplemental funding is cut by 11%, which could total $128,000 for Worcester. That's extended time for our Head Start students.
• There's also a 20% cut in MCAS student support, 22% in innovation schools, and 6.5% in extended learning time.

More coming late next week.
UPDATE: and some commentary here. 

But wait! There's more!

Last night, I only got through the DESE line items. I'd forgotten that there are education items in other sections of the budget. Those are also being hit:

Oh, man: $2.5M from $4.5M from programs for ELL students in Gateway Cities. Now down below FY14 level #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Early college initiative zeroed out ($738,750 entirely gone) #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

STEM teacher corps likewise zeroed out ($125,000. They'd already lost half in November) #mabudgetcuts #MAEdu
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$400K (from $15M) from Birth thru Preschool (Just what we know we need to focus on) #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Here's Head Start: a $1M cut from a $9M budget. #MaEdu #mabudgetcuts Literally balancing the budget on the backs of needy preschoolers.
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

K1 classroom grants zeroed out. Started the year at $1M. Last $750K cut. #MaEdu #Mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Plus, two that aren't education directly, but are certainly related:

$1M (from $18M) cut from services for infants and parents #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$350K (from $19.8M) from summer jobs for at risk youth #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Full list, as you've seen above, is at  #mabudgetcuts

Baker administration budget cuts (you'd better believe they're hitting local levels!)

I've spent some time this evening looking at the spreadsheet of budget cuts announced today by the Baker administration. They were announced with great fanfare as not hitting local aid.
Well, take a look.
I'm just cutting my tweets of this in here, as I'm in a rush. Sorry if it's a bit messy. 

Regional library local aid getting another $42K hit out of a $97M line item #MAbudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

.@Worcester_PL Talking Books program losing almost $2000 from a $440K line item (ctr in Watertown loses $,too) #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$2M from child & mental health, $6.6M from mental health incl homeless & emer, $1.4M from emer svc & mental health care #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Oh, and $920K from inpatient & community based mental health #Mabudgetcuts (Someone out there in the 4th estate is going to cover this...?)
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

(Interesting: no cut in correctional facilities) #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

DESE losing $380K from their $13M budget #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

METCO (holy cow!) losing $943,000 (from $18.8M budget) #mabudgetcuts #MAEdu
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$106,984 from literary programs (DESE program) #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Nothing cut from the $2.7M of "school to career connecting activities" #MaEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Well, regional districts, you dodged yet another cut on transportation this round #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

At a time when we already are criticially underfunding special education: $250,000 cut from the circuit breaker #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

Not surprising: $1.9M cut in charter school reimbursement. Already underfunded at $78M #MAedu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$250,000 cut from innovation schools #MAEdu #Mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

(BTW, those last three will hit WPS, @worcesterpublic) #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

We don't have enough tech for PARCC but $23,800 cut from ed tech programs #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$1.7M from MCAS low scoring support, $500K from underperforming schools, $139K from college/career readiness #MAEdu #mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

$197K from safe & supportive schls #MAedu #Mabudgetcuts
— Tracy Novick (@TracyNovick) February 4, 2015

There's more, by the way. That's just the ones that are somewhat education connected. A lot of that is going to have be done, anyway, and guess where that's going to come? Local budgets.
UPDATE: There are even more just in education.

Budget cut

...passes as proposed. 

School Committee meets this Thursday

The Worcester School Committee meets on Thursday at 7 PM. You can find the agenda here.
After a few honors (I wonder if we are having any of these musicians sing the National Anthem?), the report of the superintendent is the--held--discussion on the proposed International Baccalaureate school. While we don't have an item on the agenda for it, public comment is allowed under suspension, and do remember that you can always get in touch with us at schoolcommittee (at) worc.k12.ma.us (and I'm really hoping to hear from our student reps on this, too).
We'll then take up the proposed bid spec that passed F&O tonight.
We have a prior year fiscal payment of $14,811,73 that we're being asked to approve for services for a special education student at the Robert F. Kennedy Action Corps (we never received an invoice).
Miss Biancheria is asking for an update on the filling of the Worcester Tech principal position.
She's also looking for our (annual) report on the $1 per pupil provided for elementary schools for recess.
We're being asked to accept a Strategic Support Grant from the state for $100,000.
Mr. O'Connell is asking that we, "pursuant to Rule 50 of the School Committee" hold a hearing on the deisolation plan (Rule 50 says it was supposed to have happened last meeting. We haven't had one during my time on the School Committee). 
And--we knew it was coming but here it is!--we are being asked to "adjust" the budget. What we have to do is CUT the budget by $450,061, as our charter reimbursement is--AGAIN--short. In fact, it's nearly a million dollars short, but the city is holding us harmless on $500,000 of that. THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU KEEP INCREASING CHARTER SCHOOLS WITHOUT REGARDS TO FUNDING.
Oh, it's being cut from special education, and it's balancing out only because the Collaborative still has frozen our tuition rate. In other words, it's only a happy coincidence of timing that the Worcester Public Schools aren't having to cut a half a million dollars out of the budget in December.
We're being asked to raise our mileage reimbursement rate to $0.575 from $0.56 per mile, per the 2015 standard (federal) mileage rate.
Mr. O'Connell is asking that we recognize the contributions of Ted Coghlin to the Worcester Public Schools.

We also have three items in executive session: one on bargaining with our Educational Secretaries; a grievance; one on the Superintendent's contract. The committee will take those up at 6 PM.

Transportation matters, but it won't affect foundation

I'm always pleased to see the T&G give space to covering something as important as the WPS budget, so good reading today on the coverage of yesterday's Research Bureau/WEC event. It's also nice to see Mr. Sinacola's kind words (?) on the budget, 'though taking credit "even a small role" for our managing the fiscal cliff from stimulus aid is a bit rich.
I do have question the efficacy of something raised by City Manager Augustus, Mayor Petty, and Mr. Sinacola, however: counting transportation towards foundation. The issue, as presented, is that transportation, which this year will cost WPS $14 million a year, does not count towards the foundation budget. Thus, from a particular perspective, the city spends $14 million that "doesn't count" when the state calculations how much we spend on schools, and, the argument goes, that isn't fair.
The thing is, though, that transportation doesn't count towards ANYONE's foundation. If the state suddenly started counting transportation towards foundation, all that does is raise EVERYONE's requirement towards foundation. Thus, if transportation were to count towards foundation, and get folded in, the requirements on funding would just expand to add that account.
What it wouldn't do is make any difference in any of the other accounts...and thus it wouldn't make any difference in where we are on funding. The level would be higher, but we'd be in the same place.
We'd still be underfunded.

Funding the Worcester Public Schools: WEC and Research Bureau presentation

I'm at Mass College of Pharmacy for the second presentation on funding the schools. Live blogging as we go