The comprehensive annual financial report (CAFR) that I have used to develop important financial and budget data that are unique is the Elizabeth School District. Once initial impressions and tentative conclusions are gathered from the CAFR and districts website for period ending June 30, 2013, I will give an overview of budget and financial issues by comparing and contrasting the differences found based on the initial review and after the interview with the business administrator. Additionally provide new information found after the interview that was not included in the CAFR. Next, I will emphasize on important topics to better understand the context of the district’s budget and financials. Last part of the components will emphasize specific impressions and conclusions about the fieldwork assignment. Elizabeth School District is part of Union County headquartered in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The district has 34 schools that provide a full range of educational services and serves students from prekindergarten through 12th grade. This includes regular and vocational as well as special education for handicapped youngsters. The City of Elizabeth is the fourth largest municipality and the fourth largest school district in New Jersey out of 603 districts. The community is culturally diverse and constantly expanding. Approximately 68% of students are classified as Hispanic; 22% black, 8% white and 2% Asian. It’s estimated 44 different languages are spoken by the student body with the largest percentages of students speaking Spanish, English, Haitian Creole and Portuguese making 13% of the students enrolled in bilingual education classes. Since 2000 through 2013 the school population increased over 5,350 students. During the 2012-2013 t... ... middle of paper ... ...propriated budgets are done for the general fund, special revenue fund and the debt service fund which are approved by the voters of the municipality. The method used to account for outstanding purchases is encumbrance accounting that are either closed at year-end or canceled. If left open they are accounted for in the re-appropriations of fund balance in the subsequent year called reservations. The accounting system is organized on the basis of funds and account groups explained in the notes of the CAFR. Works Cited http://ballotpedia.org/Elizabeth_Public_Schools,_New_Jersey#cite_note-15 http://www.elizabeth.k12.nj.us/education/components/scrapbook/default.php?sectionid=1 http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2011/08/2_elizabeth_school_district_of.html http://www.state.nj.us/education/data/ http://www.state.nj.us/education/finance/fp/cafr/search/13/1320.pdf
Connecting people to the success of the district is one matter, but asking them to support it financially is another. The district is growing in size and is in need of new facilities and internal academic structures to support the growth. As the district continues to grow she is challenged with ensuring that the schools continue to interact with each other and do not return to the independent silos they were when she arrived. Ms. Hall realizes that she is the internal and external face of the district. She takes that very seriously and therefore, tires to view challenges as opportunities and successes as building blocks and
School funding is a recurring issue in the modern era. Debates ranging from give schools more money, to get rid of the system in place and reform a new idea have been plaguing the world over the years. “The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, signed in 2009, provided more than $100 billion in education aid to offset budget cuts..” (School Finance). Later, “Congress provided an additional $10 billion in 2010 to avert mass teacher layoffs (Education Week, "Total Recovery Act")” (School Funding). These numbers are just a sample of the struggles in school funding, that is costing a ton of money to keep afloat. “There are many ways schools fund varying from state to state and even school to school. Income taxes, corporate taxes, sales taxes, and other fees provide 48 percent of the elementary and secondary school funds. 44 percent of local districts draw money from local property taxes. The federal government makes up approximately 8 percent of state education budgets. These funds are a dealt out on a per-student basis, and categorically to ensure enough resources for each special program or facility” (School Funding). These funds play a huge role in every student's education, either positive or negative. The three main areas that need to be addressed in the school budget are extracurricular funding, building and equipment maintenance, and last but not least staff funding.
An important part of the budget-balancing process is to analyze each potential cuts and evaluate them against the district's mission before implementing them into the strategic plan. These suggestions of privatizing the janitorial and food services, improving transpiration efficiency, maintaining and improving green efficiencies, renting out unused facilities and implementing a four-day work week are good suggestions that facilitates a long-term expenditure savings. These suggestions previously have allowed other school districts to meet their budget needs and find themselves in a better financial position. This concludes our findings and provides the final report of cost reduction recommendations. My staff and I are available to assist immediately in implementation planning and execution.
South Carolina Education Department (2014). The Average Daily Membership. Retrieve on February 25th, 2014. Form https://ed.sc.gov/data/student-counts/AverageDailyMembershipandAttendance.cfm
• To oversee the financial performance of the school ensuring the money is spent effectively and how it is spent
Cummins, J. (1992). Language proficiency, bilingualism and academic achievement. The multicultural classroom: Readings for content area teachers (pp. 15-26).
Despite the high number of ELL students, it is difficult to know, because of lack of data to see what type of educational programs they participate in. According to Prospects, a 1995 national survey, reading and math were taught in programs using bilingual education in less than half of first and third grade classrooms serving limited English proficient students. Offered more frequently were programs where instruction was offered only in English, or where instructional aides, not teachers, were the vehicles for native language instruction.
Echevarria, J. Teaching language minority students in elementary schools (Research Brief No. 1). Santa Cruz, CA, and Washington, DC: Center for Research on Education, Diversity & Excellence. (2003)
You’re a ninth grader at a school in Philadelphia. The neighborhood is poor, even if not all of the students are. Your school has very little money for things like computers or technology. You walk into second period one day, sit down, and discover that the floor next to your desk is damp. The teacher explains that there is a leak in the roof, and that the school can’t afford to fix it. The school can’t afford to fix the leak or buy computers because it is inadequately funded. So the government kindly lends your school the money to not only fix the leak, but buy computers. But does that necessarily motivate you to improve your grades? Do you suddenly decide to do your homework because the leak is fixed? Probably not. The government sees that your grades remained the same, and two years later, when our school needs to hire more teachers and make the classes smaller, the government denies the school that money. They say that since money didn’t help your grades last time, why should it help you now?
Assessing the environment is the second part of step four in the strategic planning process. The organizational internal assessment is important in identifying the strengths and weaknesses of Brendel Elementary School. By providing an organizational assessment, the planning team can clarify the aspects that help in accomplish the mission and fulfill the mandates in the organization. This part of step four enriches the management information system (MIS) with more qualitative data in order to make MIS more effective. Moreover, the organizational assessment clarifies the organization’s competencies, distinctive competencies, and core competencies. (Bryson 2011, 166)
Gibson, C. H. (2011). Financial reporting & analysis: Using financial accounting information. (12th ed.). Mason, OH: South-Western Cengage Learning.
Because members of school administration are entrusted with the management of public funds, administrators must act ethically and with integrity to ensure school funds are utilized responsibly and that policies that affect the district’s financial integrity are closely examined. Therefore, policies, such as approval of expenditures and payroll, finance and goal setting, and the preparation of the budget, that directly impact the financial integrity of a school district should be carefully
I learned a few things about my school and myself in regards to this area of leadership by participating in this activity. I learned that my school asks for very little participation from the teachers and community in regards to the budgeting process. But it could be an excellent venue to review prior year accomplishments as well as decide on future objectives with these stakeholders. If I were an administrator, involving the community and faculty would not only help in maintaining awareness, but I could also use this as a way to help those who may not be directly vested in my school, but who are helping fund it through their taxes, recognize effective administration in our efforts to reduce costs and provide needed resources to the various programs. I also feel that budget decisions cannot be solely programmatic or solely monetary. There needs
A successful budget calls not only for proficient measures in its preparation but also for stringent measures to oversee its administration/execution. This is because of the many counterforces that bombard the budget system. These counterforces include, for example, unscrupulous officials who would like to use the budget funds inappropriately; involuntary mistakes, such as miscalculations, that would overstate or understate the budgeted figures can also occur. To prevent these eventualities from disturbing the budgeting process, stringent administ...
I attended a second grade class at Smallville Elementary on February 22, 2014; the class began promptly at 0855. There are 26 children in this second grade class. There are 15 male students and 11 female students. The student diversity is 2 Hispanics, 1 African-American, 1 East Indian, and 1 New Zealander (White but with an extreme accent). Three children were left-handed.