The property tax bills have started going out around the county - the annual reminder to homeowners in towns from Brattleboro to Londonderry of how much it costs to educate our children.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Vermont spent $14,300 per pupil on K-12 education in the 2007-2008 school year, the fifth-highest total in the nation. By comparison, New Hampshire spent $11,619 per pupil, ranking 14th.
Both Vermont and New Hampshire came in well above the national average of $10,259 per student. If this spending sounds high, it is because those Census Bureau figures also factor in teacher retirement costs. In case you were wondering which states spent the least per pupil, they were Utah ($5,765), Idaho ($6,931), Arizona ($7,608), Oklahoma ($7,685), and Tennessee ($7,739).
The Census Bureau study also found that Vermont spent $56.80 for every $1,000 in personal income on K-12 education, the second highest figure in the country, trailing only Alaska. New Hampshire ranked 26th at $41.74 per $1,000 of income, just below the national average of $42.14.
During the same period of the Census Bureau study, Vermont had an 11-to-1 student-teacher ratio - the lowest in the country, according to the U.S. Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics. New Hampshire's ratio was 13-to-1, compared with a national average of 15.5-to-1.
So both Vermont and New Hampshire spend more on education and have lower student-teacher ratios than the national average. Does this translate into better educational outcomes?
On the most recent batch of reading and math tests, Vermont's eighth-graders ranked second and fourth, respectively, in the nation, while New Hampshire ranked of seventh and ninth.
Those who believe Vermont spends too much on education say that Vermont's school enrollment has declined by 14 percent since 1997, yet districts have hired more teachers and paraprofessionals. Vermont has a student-to-adult staff ratio in its schools of less than 5-to-1.
As Vermont school districts start the planning process on their fiscal year 2012 budgets, they have been told to start finding savings by Education Commissioner Armando Vilaseca.
As part of the broader government-restructuring initiative called Challenges for Change, Vilaseca and the Legislature is seeking more than $23 million in cuts statewide, which represents a 2-percent reduction of aggregate school spending in Vermont in fiscal 2011, minus federal aid and other miscellaneous funds.
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What does this mean for Windham County's four supervisory unions?
• Windham Central - which includes Leland & Gray Union High School - needs to find $234,871 in savings, which is 1.471 percent less than its fiscal 2011 budget of $15.9 million.
• Windham Southeast - which includes Brattleboro Union High School - will need to cut 1.861 percent, or $762,176. Its fiscal 2011 budget is $40.9 million.
• Windham Southwest - which includes Twin Valley High School - faces a 2.142-percent reduction, or $219,872. Its fiscal 2011 budget is $10.2 million.
Windham Northeast - which includes Bellows Falls Union High School - will have to spend 2.334 percent, or $436,346, less than its fiscal 2011 budget of $18.2 million.
By individual schools, the cuts range from 0.6 percent at Dover Elementary to 2.34 percent at Bellows Falls Union High School.
These budget reductions are not mandatory, but Vilaseca said that if school districts don't make the recommended cuts, he will ask the Legislature to order these cuts to be made.
We think Vilaseca doesn't need to worry.
For all the bluster about “out-of-control” education spending, according to Paul Cillo at the Public Assets Institute, a Vermont think tank, education spending has ranged between 5 percent and 6 percent for the past 16 years.
Not only has that figure been relatively flat, but the actual rate of increase in total education spending has fallen in recent years, mostly due to the restraint shown by school boards and voters over the past couple of years.
Total spending for schools in fiscal 2011 is about what it was in fiscal 2010, despite factors largely beyond districts' control, such rising health-care costs and personnel costs that fall under negotiated contracts.
We would expect school boards and voters to display similar restraint at next year's town and school district meetings, even with the threat of mandated cuts.
While many Vermonters recognize that public education is expensive, they are able to balance those costs against what it takes to achieve excellence. It does mean, however, that the balance will be a little harder to maintain.