[Local-Maine-Schools] Regional School Union fact sheet

Thu Feb 21 15:27:00 UTC 2008

21 February 2008
To Maine State Legislators:

Attached is 'Why Regional Unions Work', a fact sheet outlining the
advantages of Regional School Unions, the school reorganization option
allowed under the Damon amendment to LD 1932.

The same information sheet is available on the web at:
http://mdischools.net/Why_Regional_Unions_work.htm

or, in printable form:
http://mdischools.net/Why_Regional_Unions_work.pdf

We, the undersigned, having many deep concerns and strong reservations about
the present school reorganization law, nevertheless strongly encourage
legislators to preserve in LD 1932 the option of Regional School Unions as
well as any others which may be beneficial to Maine students. Many
reorganizing districts may find significant practical benefits from
alternative associations to those currently mandated by the law.

Sincerely yours,

   - Brian Hubbell, School Committee and RPC Vice-chair, Bar Harbor
   - Ernie Easter, MLTI Teacher Leader, New Sweden
   - Dexter Bellows, Selectboard Chair, Town of Hancock
   - Bill Ferm, RPC facilitator, Mount Desert
   - Judith Jones, Hope
   - Nancy Easter-Hudak, New Sweden
   - Liz Erickson, School Committee, Tremont
   - Scott K. Porter, Maine Small Schools Coalition, Machias
   - Mary Wallace, MDI HS, Lamoine
   - Richard Barter, Karen Barter, Patrick Barter, Town of Mount Desert.
   - Margaret T. Jeffery, School Committee, Bar Harbor
   - Ronald Jenkins, Superintendent, Maine Indian Education
   - Barry McLaughlin, Superintendent Union 107, Woodland, Cooper, Grand
   Lake Stream, Meddybemps, Princeton, Talmadge, and Waite
   - Kathy Gilpatrick, Gouldsboro
   - George Crawford, Teacher, Jonesboro Elementary School
   - Amy Young, School Committee, Southwest Harbor
   - Gail Marshall, School Board and RPC Chair, Mount Desert
   - Henri Gignoux, RPC representative, Steuben
   - Elisa Hurley, Bar Harbor
   - Alene Staley, Lisbon
   - Dick Atlee, Southwest Harbor
   - Ellen and Harry Brawley, Mount Desert
   - Amanda Dyer, Bar Harbor Teachers' Association
   - Judy Sproule, School Board, Trenton
   - Ruth A. Eveland, Town Council Chair, Bar Harbor
   - Tom Burton, School Committee Chair, Bar Harbor
   - Harold Casey, Hancock County Technical Center, Ellsworth
   - Gisele Faucher, Madawaska Education Association
   - Susan Covino Buell, Southwest Harbor
   - Tammy Tripler, School Board chair and RPC representative, Swan's
   Island.
   - Gary C. Hunt, Esq., Attorney at Law, Ellsworth
   - John Sharood, Director, SAD 71, Kennebunk
   - Kimberly Steinbarger, School Committee and RPC representative, Beech
   Hill School, Otis
   - Audrey Carter, RPC representative, Surry
   - Julia Schloss, Town Councilor, Bar Harbor
   - Eric Henry, School Committee, Southwest Harbor
   - Omar Norton, Eastport
   - Gordon Donaldson, University of Maine

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*Option of Regional Unions will allow more extensive school reorganization*

Many school Reorganization Planning Committees are finding that local
expenses in reorganized districts will be higher than the local cost of not
reorganizing -- even after adding in penalties for non-compliance. These
higher costs may result from the additional costs of uniform regional pay
scales and cost-shifts between municipalities that are beyond remedy by
regional cost-sharing.

Voters in these towns will vote down reorganization plans.

As a result, fewer reorganized districts will be formed and Maine will end
up with more than 80 regional school administrations.  State and local
taxpayers will miss opportunities for more efficient schools and cost
savings. Voters will be angry at the State about the resulting penalties.

Regional Unions provide an alternative vehicle for some districts to achieve
regional efficiencies without incurring prohibitive additional local
expenses.

According to education policy analyst David Silvernail, the costs of
governance and administration of existing school unions are not
statistically distinguishable from those in SADs administering schools in
towns of similar size and valuation.

Through Regional Unions, the Damon amendment to LD 1932 allows more coherent
regional administration, more coordinated curricula, more common bargaining
units, and more overall collaborative cooperation, than will otherwise be
possible – exactly the kind of administrative consolidation many have said
was the original purpose of this entire effort.

In Regional Unions, citizens retain their close local connection and
budgetary oversight of their schools while still realizing the education
benefits which result from coordinated regional cooperation.  The State
saves no less money than it would otherwise from reorganization and the
schools are improved.

*Local taxpayers and the State both will benefit from the greater scope and
success of school reorganization made possible through the Damon amendment.*
*Don't Regional Unions cost more than other school governance models?*

The Department of Education recently has
suggested<http://mdischools.net/20080214_DoE_Table.pdf>that Union
governance, on average, costs at least $1000 more annually per
pupil than other forms of school governance.

That statistic is categorically misapplied.

Regional Unions provide a vehicle for municipal school units to
*reduce*<http://mdischools.net/20070402_Donaldson_SchoolUnions.pdf>administrative
expenses by sharing them with other municipalities.  So, by
definition, Unions are administratively at least as efficient as municipal
school districts and almost certainly substantially *more efficient* than
their member municipalities would be if they operated independently.

Like standard Reorganized School Units, Regional Unions are governed by the
same elected citizens who serve on local boards.  Only the same trivial
expenses of governance are incurred under either model.

In similarly-sized systems serving similarly-valued municipalities,
administration
costs are indistinguishable<http://mainegov-images.informe.org/education/data/indicators/07rcf20percent.pdf>between
Unions and other governance structures.  Compare system
administration costs in Bar Harbor's Union 98 school with those of
consolidated districts in towns of similar size with similar coastal
valuations.

Bar Harbor, Union 98: 4.14%, ($474 per student)
SAD 28, Camden: 4.12%, ($454)
SAD 50, Thomaston: 4.89% ($593)
SAD 56 in Searsport: 4.33%, ($519)

David Silvernail, in a January 8, 2008 presentation to the Legislature's
Education Committee, reported that no clean conclusion can be
drawn<http://mainetalk.org/pipermail/local-maine-schools_mainetalk.org/2008-January/000533.html>about
the relationship between overall per-pupil cost and governance
structure.  From below-average to above-average, the full range of costs is
represented in every type of school administrative system. According to
Silvernail, the single greatest predictor of per-pupil cost is community
valuation.

So, what is shown by the Department's numbers is evidence that Union
structures may more comfortably (and perhaps even more efficiently) serve
regions with fewer people and therefore smaller class sizes and also regions
of higher valuation and less state subsidy where more local money is spent
in the classroom on expanded educational programs.

To see where the extra $1000 per pupil is spent in Union schools, compare
the State average for "regular
instruction<http://mainegov-images.informe.org/education/data/indicators/07rcf20pp.pdf>
" with this cost center in the following high performing Union schools:

Maine average: $4,119
Bar Harbor: $5,238
Boothbay: $5,774
Mount Desert: $6,383
Palermo: $5,134
Veazie: $6,457

* This is where the money goes in many Union schools:  to the essential core
of school business and the very area of education that reorganization is
intended to bolster, not to inefficient regional administration. *

* The Damon Amendment will help such districts achieve further
administrative savings without incurring the costs associated with the
current law.*

*Doesn't local control deprive students of educational opportunity?*

Evidently not<http://www.usm.maine.edu/cepare/Reports/IdentifyingHigher.pdf>
.

Identical percentages of schools within consolidated School Administrative
Districts (42 of 313) and municipalities (46 of 359) are classified as
higher performing.

However, 21% (66 of 313) of the schools in SADs are classified as *lower
performing*, while only 11% (40 of 359) of municipal schools are.

*Students do better in schools that are closely connected to their
communities through local oversight. Schools without that local connection
are more likely to underperform.*

*How are budgets raised and validated in Regional Unions?*

Budgets will be assembled just as they are currently in unions.  Each
municipality will budget, approve, validate, and assess its own share of
local expense along with its portion of the regional budget.  Expenses for
regional core functions, as set out by the reorganization plan approved at
local referendum, will be set by the combined local boards and these
regional expenses will become part of each local budget and subject to the
same requirements of local validation.
*No one scrutinizes school budgets more closely than a municipal warrant
committee and local voters at town meeting.*

*Don't Union superintendents spend too much of their time in too many local
meetings?*

There is no doubt that Union superintendents frequently are intimately
connected with their schools. Many find this vertical integration to be an
efficient way to stay closely informed on essential administrative issues.
Similarly, many Union schools directly benefit from this contact from
superintendents who carry a unifying educational vision.

Local issues often are more efficiently resolved at local meetings then they
would be at prolonged regional meetings.  So the total time spent directly
in local meetings rather than in meetings with intermediary subcommittees
may not be greater than in consolidated districts.

(Note also, that in Regional Unions formed under the Damon amendment, the
superintendent is not required to attend meetings of the local education
units, but may delegate that job to others with administrative credentials,
such as a building principal.)

*Schools that are closely supported through governance and administrators
can achieve greater educational goals more efficiently.*

*Will Regional Unions divert state funds for education from areas like
Portland that don't have Unions?*

No. State General Purpose Aid to education is distributed according to the
State's formula for Essential Programs and Services which is regionally
altered to account for local labor markets and relative local property
valuation.  Subsidies are not affected by the structure of school
governance.  The Damon amendment carries no fiscal impact; it shifts no
money in state aid.

*School expenses above state-determined and state-limited levels of GPA are
borne only by local taxpayers.  *

---------------------------------------------

References:

Maine Department of Education, Handout to
legislators<http://mdischools.net/20080214_DoE_Table.pdf>,
February 14, 2008
Gordon A. Donaldson, Jr., School Unions in Maine: A Viable
Alternative<http://mdischools.net/20070402_Donaldson_SchoolUnions.pdf>,
April 2, 2007
Department of Education, 2006-07 Financial Indicators for School
Administrative Units --
percentages<http://mainegov-images.informe.org/education/data/indicators/07rcf20percent.pdf>
Brian Hubbell, Notes from Education Committee work
session<http://mainetalk.org/pipermail/local-maine-schools_mainetalk.org/2008-January/000533.html>,
January 8, 2008
Department of Education, 2006-07 Financial Indicators for School
Administrative Units – per-pupil expenditure
amounts<http://mainegov-images.informe.org/education/data/indicators/07rcf20pp.pdf>
David L. Silvernail; The Identification of Higher and Lower Performing Maine
Schools <http://www.usm.maine.edu/cepare/Reports/IdentifyingHigher.pdf>,
School Profiles and Characteristics; Maine Education Policy Research
Institute; May 2007

--------------------
MDIschools.net <http://mdischools.net/>, 2/19/2008
Contact: Brian Hubbell, mailto:sparkflashgap at gmail.com<sparkflashgap at gmail.com>
* *
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