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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The MCPS operating budget has gone from $1 billion to $3.3 billion with almost flat enrollment.[/quote]

Has that kept the system healthy?  Did the $1B?

How have costs risen due to inflation?  What additional expenditures have been mandated by the county, state and federal governments?  Might programs like pre-K added to the MCPS scope in the interim be more costly on a per-student basis?  How has the underfunding of the capital budget during the same time, and from the accumulated capital infrastructure debt before, increased ongoing operational cost due to more frequent maintenance needs, sourcing of scarcer legacy components, etc.?  What amount of the current budget is due to the prior underfunding of insurance obligations and the like?

The late 1980s into the 1990s saw a number of school closures/consolidations with enrollment declines.  These had to be corrected with the student population rebound, but for a while there was less lumpiness in the overcrowding of schools.  When was the last comprehensive boundary study to correct that?  What operational savings (not to mention student experience improvements) could have come from having that happen on a more frequent basis that, instead, are reflected in the budgetary increase?

What is the additional expense due to the significant increases in students on FARMS and students with EML/ELL/ESOL need?  What is the difference in experience rate, encompassing population proportion and average cost of implementation, for 504 & IEP services?  What less direct expense increases can be attributed to such demographic & sociological causes?

Now do the same for MCPS magnet/GT education.  What is the history/trend in inflation-adjusted per-pupil spend for these programs, that is, net of the cost that would be incurred for the same population in providing standard curricula? What is the history and trend in the population of highly able students?  How do these compare with the spending decisions for other initiatives within MCPS?  Are those other initiatives discretionary, or do they have statutory requirements?  GT education in MD does, though that seems largely to be ignored by MCPS, which waves at the loose COMAR wording to claim compliance with the letter (but not the spirit) -- that seems to be a different sentiment to that given by MCPS to some of the other initiatives, though that is not to say they enjoy unfettered administrative support.

I'm sure there are inefficiencies and abuses in the system. I'd like to see them corrected, too.  Lower taxes sure would be nice.  I get that not everyone is up for a proper case study, either, but demonizing the system based on unexamined top-line budget numbers is completely irresponsible.

The budget request for 2025-26 is $3.6B, with a current student population of just under 160,000.  In 1991, the MoCo Council told MCPS it wasn't going to get the funding it wanted due to a downturn in the economy.  The figure was $764M vs. the $782M requested for the 91-92 school year, with a contemporaneous student population of about 103,500.  On a per-pupil, inflation-adjusted basis, the FY26 request would be about 28.5% higher than the FY92 request.  Do those differences mentioned above, and others like them, reasonably explain the additional 28.5%?  I don't have the detailed information to know, but I don't put it anywhere outside the realm of possibility.  As stated, I'd like to see better management, but I would guess that those in 1991 were saying the same.

That Council has been blue for a long time, and one would think that would translate into significant support for education.  They say they want these programs, but they are politicians, and they know where their bread is buttered -- the high proportion of donor money coming from age and/or wealth tends to result in influence to advocate for lower taxes, and the former often no longer have the abiding interest in education funding that they might have had when raising their own families.  There also has been, as always in modern times at least, disproportional funding from the real estate industry.  Back in the 60s to the mid-70s, and with effect lingering into the 80s, the benefit those saw was from providing units for the exploding suburban population of young, middle- to upper-middle-class families seeking single family homes with good education options for their children paramount.  Now, there's less opportunity for that, despite the continued demand, with the closer-in areas all built out and large swathes of the county restricted from such development.  The new votes they can get, and the housing development that would support it, while certainly attracted to good education, might not hold that in quite the same light as those moving to the county a couple of generations ago.  There's gold in them thar hills!  (If only there are changes to permit additional housing without attention to the associated financial needs of schools...and the real estate/development community has organized very well to make sure this has happened and continues happening.)  Between the two, donors and electorate trends, the Council has found its way, more often than not over the past three decades, to underfund the school system, and the cumulative effect of that is what we see today.

Like in the meetings over this past month, there were tears shed as BOE members in 1991 had to abandon funding for certain programs -- at that time, expansion of Kindergarten to full day was among those initiatives delayed, similar to today's VA cut and delay of pre-K expansion.  Was that the right call?  Should Kindergarten still be a half day?  We could save money and still claim the Kindergarten enrollment in our denominator![/quote]

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