The Wichita Falls ISD reports that they spend about $5700/student.
The district’s total population is 15,013 students K-12 with a total budget of $86,000,000 (inclusive of debt service, maintenance & operations, campus activity funds, special revenue fund). Doing the math, that would equal $5728.37 per student.
While this is about $2,000 higher than local private school tuition (as compared to the local Catholic high school that is operating very close to the red after support from the city’s parishes), I don’t believe it is that out of line.
The school district runs:
* a bus service
* two active International Baccalaureate schools while in the application status for a third
* pays the user fees for students taking AP/IB exams
* have fully-support art/music programs at all levels
* maintain magnet programs at all 7 secondary campuses (without Federal Magnet funding)
* maintain magnet programs at eight elementary campuses (without Federal Magnet funding)
* operates a career and applied technology center
While I am sure some districts may be wasting money somewhere, I don’t believe that broad numbers should be an indictive sign that government schools are wasteful. Let’s hire some people that know what they are doing, take that money and more and make our schools into cathedrals of education. Let’s make them run better and smoother; not take away funding, yet.
[This entry is responding to a reformk12.com entry.]
The district’s total population is 15,013 students K-12 with a total budget of $86,000,000 (inclusive of debt service, maintenance & operations, campus activity funds, special revenue fund). Doing the math, that would equal $5728.37 per student.
While this is about $2,000 higher than local private school tuition (as compared to the local Catholic high school that is operating very close to the red after support from the city’s parishes), I don’t believe it is that out of line.
The school district runs:
* a bus service
* two active International Baccalaureate schools while in the application status for a third
* pays the user fees for students taking AP/IB exams
* have fully-support art/music programs at all levels
* maintain magnet programs at all 7 secondary campuses (without Federal Magnet funding)
* maintain magnet programs at eight elementary campuses (without Federal Magnet funding)
* operates a career and applied technology center
While I am sure some districts may be wasting money somewhere, I don’t believe that broad numbers should be an indictive sign that government schools are wasteful. Let’s hire some people that know what they are doing, take that money and more and make our schools into cathedrals of education. Let’s make them run better and smoother; not take away funding, yet.
[This entry is responding to a reformk12.com entry.]
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