MCPS budget and class size/teacher cuts
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Anonymous
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Everyone at our school is being told to push the County Council and State to give MCPS more money to stop the class sizes from growing. Our elementary school will lose three teachers which is terrible for any school where the students and parents know the long time teachers.
It seems unlikely that the state is going to keep giving MCPS more money. Why do we not have the option to cut other parts of the MCPS budget? Class sizes and teachers are the most basic functions of a school system. MCPS has a ton of other programs, outreach activities, grew its PR team and legal teams, the curriculum team, and other funded areas beyond direct instructional staff. Why are these always off limits but the teachers are the first to go? |
Anonymous
They're not off limits. According to the Washington Post, the plan is for 370 fewer school-based positions and 40 fewer central-services positions. The school-based positions include ESOL and special ed teachers, reading specialists, staff development teachers, media assistants, and instructional data analysts. |
Anonymous
| What is an "instructional data analyst", and why do we need one? |
Anonymous
| I would consider ESOL, special education and math/reading specialists teachers to be direct instructional teachers. The staff development is something that could go if the budget is too tight. |
Anonymous
They are the people who set up, coordinate, and handle all the data from the standardized testing. They are responsible for PARCC, MAP testing, and other school-wide and grade-level testing. They really are essential employees. No teachers or administrators have time to handle all the testing that is done. |
Anonymous
We could also stop the massive urbanization of parts of the county that are causing some of the huge rise in enrollment. Slow the rate of students, you slow the need for more money. |
Anonymous
| When they discuss the effects of budget cuts they always mention the things that get people to act. If they said they were going to delay redoing the playground blacktops or use cheaper pencils, no would would pay attention. |
Anonymous
What if we took a break from the testing? |
Anonymous
| The Shared Accountability division is HUGE. There are multiple departments with multiple units. The same is even more true for the Curriculum and Instructional Office. These offices could be paired back significantly. |
Anonymous
+1. They really are essential. In many schools, it's not a full-time position anyway. Sometimes it's paired with media assistant or secretary to get the employee up to full time. |
Anonymous
| Why shouldn't the state keep giving mcps money? Everyone knows that people who pay a lot in taxes move to MoCo for the schools. Cut the schools off at the knees and everyone will move to fairfax county or the district and the state will lose our huge tax payments. I could save an hour a day in commuting if I moved into NW dc. If I have to pay for a private anyway, guess who is going to get my tax dollars? |
Anonymous
| I just don't think the property taxes in MoCo (or Fairfax, or anywhere else in this area) are that high. Compared to other areas in the country with excellent schools, they are quite low. The problem with increasing the taxes, though, is that Montgomery County will probably piddle away the gains in a way that the average taxpayer/public school user does not want. |
Anonymous
| MCPS needs to do a better job of spending. I would much prefer more teachers to computers and smart boards and other gadgets in the classroom. |
Anonymous
Write your congressional representatives. MCPS can't do this unless Congress changes the testing requirements in the No Child Left Behind Act. |
Anonymous
Teachers are operational funding, computers and smart boards are capital funding. Two different pots of money. It would not have been possible to use the money MCPS spent on Chromebooks for teachers. |