Education and Community News from Home Town Delaware

financial-management-for-school-board-members I’ve spent the last hour or so reading blogs and stories in which our Governor and Lt. G want-to-be’s offer their cures for what ails Delaware’s schools. What is truly amazing is it sounds like a broken record offering no real commitments or answers. I keep hearing how the districts need more oversight because their not spending enough on the children. I am attaching a powerpoint to this post that explains in laymans term school financing, but I want to share my favorite slides information first:

“-All School District funds are deposited with the state and are in a bank account managed by the state along with all other state agency funds. It’s the state’s bank account.
-The State issues the checks.
-Interest is earned on this state account and distributed to school districts.
-We don’t write checks. We send requests for checks.”

So, State oversight is in place already, but the folks in Dover don’t want you to know that they are responsible for this mess. Blame the school districts and boards, who are UNPAID, ELECTED VOLUNTEERS, while the “Big Head” group worries about their feedbags! The legislators tell the media they did not raise taxes on alcohol or hospitals, but guess what the local school districts are forced to levy taxes to cover the shortfalls of the state! Real change in Dover needs to come from a complete change of the guard, and “slimming” down the DOE would be a start, not taking control away from the local boards.