Editor’s note: This commentary is by George Cross, who lives in Winooski, where he served as superintendent of schools for 12 years. He also served in the Vermont House for 10 years and is currently retired.
[W]hile education finance in Vermont is somewhat complicated and not easily understood, the fact is that we have a statewide school funding mechanism. Taxpayers in every town contribute to the financing of schools in all other towns. They do this through the statewide education property tax on both residential and non-residential property, a portion of the income tax and the sales tax, the proceeds from the lottery and a few other small income streams. While the statewide education property tax on residential properties varies by town depending on the equalized per pupil cost in each school district, taxpayers across the state contribute to the funding for every enrolled student.
There is little doubt that public education in Vermont is costly. However, trying to figure out why by simply looking at gross numbers is folly. Yes, Vermont has a low student to total staff ratio. But one needs to carefully examine the numbers inside the numbers to determine why. Vermont’s ratio of students to elementary (grades 1- 6) teachers is not much different from the average for the New England states. However, its ratio of students to pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and secondary (grades 7-12) teachers are all below average for New England. Most importantly the number of students for each paraprofessional position is substantially below average. Thus these are the areas that must be examined to find cost savings in our schools. So what does the Legislature do to help solve the staffing problem, close small elementary schools via consolidation. Many of those schools serve grades 1-6. The problem is really before and after those grades and the number of paraprofessionals. (Check the National Center for Educational Statistics for specific data.)
Where else could the Legislature look to examine education costs in Vermont. Here are three possibilities:
1. In reviewing the website for three school districts this writer found 30 job titles that he strongly suspects did not exist 15 to 20 years ago. No attempt will be made here to list all 30, but ask yourself how do these job titles contribute to the overall student to staff ratio? And, what is the Agency of Education doing to catalog how many of these positions are currently in our schools and where? Here are just a few of the job titles: Skill Tech Director, Registrar (one in every school in one district), Student Services Teacher, Student Management Specialist, IT Network Engineer, IT System Director (one district had 10 IT positions), Data Manager, Math Coach and so on. Until we know the impact of these new positions on the student/staff ratio, the ratio itself is meaningless.
2. Over the years Vermont has created a convoluted, non-system technical education system. We have technical education centers connected to regular high schools which serve a region. We have technical education school districts with school boards and superintendents which are independent school districts. We have half-time full-year programs, full-time half-year programs, full-time full-year programs, even two-year full-time programs and more. Every high school that sends students to a technical center has a full complement of academic teachers ready to teach the basic academic courses to technical program students, yet this writer found when examining several tech center websites, one center with 12 academic teachers, another has three, while most have none. Academic teachers at technical centers are simply redundant staffing.
In all of the cost breakdowns for education in Vermont when was the last time you saw the per student cost of technical education by center? Instead of looking under the cost rocks of technical education, many simply call for a greater investment in tech ed. This call goes out even though there has not been any effort to evaluate the current variety of programs to determine which one is the most cost effective and productive.
The Vermont Labor Department has a continuously updated survey of potential labor needs. How is it coordinated with our tech education programs? What percentage of its eligible students does each high school send to the regional technical center? Is there a substantial difference in this percentage by high school? If so, why? How is each center governed and what role do those who pay the bill play in this governance? There are many unanswered questions about the role technical education plays in the total cost of education in Vermont.
3. Given that our state’s public schools are funded via state taxation and other state revenues, why is there such a major difference in professional salaries across the state? Taxpayers in any given community partially pay the salaries of educators in all districts. Comparing a couple of data points (base salary and top salary for teachers with a master’s plus 30 graduate credits) across teacher salary schedules in Vermont one finds the following major differences:
• The base salary in the Essex-Westford district is $48,018 and in South Burlington $45,418, yet a teacher on the same step and level in Bradford or at Oxbow High School earns $34,767. Why is there a difference of $13,251 (38 percent) between Bradford and Essex? (Data from FY ’18 negotiated agreements.)
• Teachers in Lyndon or Burke have a top salary in the master’s plus 30 credits column of $63,437, but in Essex its $91,863, in South Burlington $91,288 and Colchester $87,362. The teacher in the first two towns have 26 steps (years) to arrive at the top salary, while those in Colchester do so in 16 steps and in South Burlington and Essex 18 steps. (Data from FY ’18 negotiated agreement.)
• The average teacher salary at Chamberlin School in South Burlington was $80,967 and at Charlotte Central School $75,737 in FY ’17 The average at Stamford Elementary was $47,221 and in Newark $43,943. Now average salaries are a function of both education and years of service of the teaching staff, but a $30,000 difference? (Data from AOE website.)
The point here is that taxpayers from all across the state pay all the teachers in the state. So why do we have these significant differences? Some will say it is caused by costs of living differences. The problem with that argument is that teachers like all other workers do not necessarily live in the town where they work or even in the same labor market.
One can undoubtedly raise the same questions about the salaries of school administrators or other district employees. That data is not so easily found.
Education policy leaders in this state need to carefully examine all parts of our education system before trying to find ways to make it more cost effective and productive. Time to turn all the rocks.
