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Education Forum: What's At Stake?
East Penn School District Administrative Offices, 800 Pine St, Emmaus, PA | Get Directions »
FREE
Discover how high stakes testing and funding cuts are impacting our kids and schools (and what you can do about it) Forum to be held in the EPSD School Board Meeting Room.
Invited Guests: Susan Gobreski- Exec Director of Education Voters PA, Area Superintendents, Educators and Administrators
Hosted by EPIC (East Penn Invested Citizens), Salisbury Parent Advisory, Allentown Parent Groups and a Coalition of Lehigh Valley Parents who support public education.
Event Details
| Where | East Penn School District Administrative Offices 800 Pine St, Emmaus, PA 18049 |
| Next on | This event is over. |
| Time | 7:00 pm–9:00 pm |
| Website | http://www.facebook.com/EpicEastPenn |
| epicupdates@gmail.com | |
| Price | $0 |
More About East Penn School District Administrative Offices
East Penn's long-standing reputation for quality public education is one big reason why many families sink deep roots in the Emmaus area. In addition to Emmaus, the district educates students who live in Upper Milford and Lower Macungie townships and in the boroughs of Macungie and Alburtis. Three of the district's 10 schools are in Emmaus: Lincoln and Jefferson elementary schools and Emmaus High School. East Penn's administration building is attached to the north side of the high school.
Public meetings of the nine-member, elected school board usually are the second and fourth Monday of each month. Meetings start at 7:30pm in the building's board room. Anyone wishing to address the board should sign up before the start of the meeting. The board imposes limits on how long you can speak and whether the subject you plan to raise is deemed appropriate.
ted.dobracki
9:04 pm on Wednesday, April 25, 2012
People in East Penn who believe that more state funding for public education will reduce their taxes are barking up the wrong tree. Asking for more gets EPSD less.
State funding for public education depends (among other things) on the wealth of the school district, and by state standards, EPSD is wealthy. Any additional state funding will go more to other school districts and not to East Penn. This redistribution may have societal benefits in that it will help provide a better education for kids in other towns, but not ours. It will not help EPSD taxpayers, either, since their state taxes will go up, without a commensurate increase in funding for our local schools.
In PA, three items in the state budget are very close in size - one is the state's contributions to K-12 education, and two more are income tax revenue and revenue from sales tax. Thus, one could say that the AVERAGE return on investment towards education on either income taxes or sales tax is about 100%.
Now let's look at the East Penn specifics. EPSD receives about $20 million from the state. But it also collects about $7 million in LOCAL earned income taxes at a 0.5% rate. Since the state levies income tax at 3.07%, the state gets more than 6 times, or $42 million just from earned income, never mind other forms of personal income earned by EPSD residents.
Thus, the return on investment for EPSD taxpayers is less than 50% or HALF of the state average. Asking for more gets EPSD less.
truth seeker
11:24 pm on Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Right Ted. If the state starting doing things like putting the charters school reimbursement back in, reimplementing the block grants and increasing funding for special education instead of flat funding it, the taxpayers in our school district would suffer. Are you of the impression that throwing a bunch of numbers around gives you some kind of credibility? You should really consider becoming a commentator on Fox News.
ted.dobracki
9:53 am on Thursday, April 26, 2012
Numbers do count. Even if you don't like what they say. I'll ignore the ad hominen attacks at the end of the last posting to express my findings a second way, and then add a couple of no cost solutions for PA school budgets. I do this under my own name, so I firmly believe this stuff and stand by it, unlike the large majority posters who seldom post under real names. I've had the fortune in my life to live in several other states after my tenure on the EPSD board, and have learned many things from those places while still following, sometimes in very close detail, EPSD affairs.
Based on data in the state budget and my own calculations, EPSD taxpayers contribute more about 0.4% of the state's income tax revenue on just their earned income tax. That percentage is actually higher since the state income tax includes other forms of income, but I don't have that data. On the other hand, EPSD receives only 0.2% of the state's funding for K-12 education. Our return on our taxpayer dollars is less than 50% compared to the average. This is why is say that groveling for more money is counter-productive for EPSD. EPSD won't get it - and it will be sent to more needy school districts - mostly places that are more urban or more rural.
(to be continued)
ted.dobracki
9:53 am on Thursday, April 26, 2012
(continued)
The mantras that people spout about funding charter schools, special education, non-public transportation and unfunded mandates may change slightly with time, but they are not new. Believe me, I've heard the same things for more than 30 years. Minor changes or tweaks under all governors have taken place over time, but EPSD's funding ratio has stayed the same. Funding hasn't gone down much under the current "evil" governor, nor did it go up much under his "good" predecessor. (although it did go up substantially during the Rendell regime for many of our urban and rural neighbor's during, which only proves my point).
Now for my other ideas:
1) Shorter labor contracts (say one or two years, instead of three to five years, which has been the norm) reduce risk for both sides. Both sides naturally want the other side to assume the risk, so eliminate it. In one place that I lived recently, one year contracts were the norm. This allowed both sides to adjust to prevailing conditions and realities. It also kept them talking all of the time, instead of making it a big deal a couple of times every decade, so communication was more open, even on non-contract issues.
(to be continued)
ted.dobracki
9:53 am on Thursday, April 26, 2012
(this is the end!)
2) Calendar year budgeting for schools has several practical advantages. First, the state's budget will be already determined and known. Second, school districts will have more opportuinities for more timely adjustments to changing budget needs with the staggerred cycles. I won't get into the wonkish details, but I've seen it in action over several cycles in a difficult situation.