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Facing a projected $4 million cut in revenue for FY11, the board of education at its retreat meeting prior to spring break made the decision to begin staggering school start times in August to save almost $1 million in bus transportation costs alone over a three-year period.
Assistant Superintendent of Administrative Services and Chief Financial Officer Jim Smith said, "For over a year now, employees have been reviewing cost savings that can be realized if we start school at different times for elementary, middle and high school students so that bus drivers can drive multiple routes.
"The proposal we took to the board was the proposal that most of our stakeholders favored. In addition to the dollars saved, students can be transported to arrive at school much closer to the time breakfast is served and instruction begins than many are now."
After numerous meetings with school councils, school faculties and parents, the board chose to adopt the option that most groups favored, which was Option 2B.
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In today's earlier edition of the COMMUNICATOR, the bell times shown for 2010-2011 were correct.
The bell times shown for current school year reflected the first bell, not the start of instruction.
The bell times for the current start of the school day are now correctly displayed below.
The morning bell time shown for both this year & next is the tardy bell which starts the instructional day.
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New school start /end schedule for 2010-11
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Current school start/end schedule | |
High school:
7:40 am to 3:00 pm |
High school:
8:00 am to 3:20 pm | |
Elementary school:
8:00 am to 2:30 pm |
Elementary school:
8:15 am to 2:45 pm | |
Middle school:
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Middle school:
8:00 am to 3:10 pm |
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The proposed plan is to open school buildings a minimum of 45 minutes prior to the beginning of the school day for students to be dropped off by parents.
School systems across Georgia and the country use staggered start times. Regionally, Fayette, Henry, Cobb, and Gwinnett counties have been using this format for several years. Griffin-Spalding studied their experience in designing its plan.
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FAQs about Staggered School Start Times
Look for updated FAQs on the school system website!
Q. Do staggered school start times affect the instructional day?
A. Staggered school start times do not change the length of the school day and or adversely affect the instructional day.
Q. Who is currently paying for school transportation?
A. Spalding County tax payers. The state provides about 37% of the total school transportation cost. The remaining 63% is funded with local tax dollars.
Q. Why was Option 2B selected?
A.
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This option had the fewest changes from current start and end times.
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This option had $100,000 more in savings over other options.
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All options were presented during school PTOs, faculty, and school council meetings. This option was best received.
Q. Will any students lose their free transportation to school?
A. None are planned at this time. The school system is required to transport students who live more than 1.5 miles from their school. However, Griffin-Spalding provides transportation for many students within that radius because of safety hazards such as four-lane highways near schools or streets with no sidewalks. The school system wants students to be safe while traveling to and from school.
Q. Will there be lay-offs of bus drivers?
A. No. Vacant bus driver positions have not been filled since last year to save dollars. Therefore, the school system has the appropriate number of drivers for this to be implemented.
Q. Did the school system consider different student/family situations and how they might be affected by a change like this?
A. Yes. The school system looked at staggered school start times from the perspective of different family situations.
Q. Will before-school care be provided for parents who have to drop their students off early?
A. Students will be cared for and supervised as they are under current conditions.
Q. Are there any "hidden perks" of this concept?
A. Yes. High school students will miss fewer classes in the afternoon because of their participation in athletics and extracurricular activities. High school students will arrive at school closer to time for classes to begin instead of having a long wait time.
Q. Where is the Georgia lottery money for education going?
A. By law, Georgia lottery proceeds pay for the Georgia Pre-K Program and for the Georgia HOPE College Scholarships.
Q. Has the school system tried swapping the high school start time with the elementary start time so older students can take care of the younger students?
A. The high school students' day is 40 minutes longer than the elementary school day. Option 2B splits time differences between the morning and afternoon to have the least impact on different school levels.
Q. What else has the school system done to save money
before making this change?
A. Many things have been done to save and reprioritize existing funds:
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Class sizes are larger
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Vacated positions have not been filled.
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The school system has networked copiers and printers to control printing costs.
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All department budgets have been cut several times.
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School budgets have been cut.
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The school system reduced the staff work schedule by three days.
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Next steps to reduce budget
(This message from Superintendent Dr. Curtis Jones was originally included in the Friday, April 16, 2010, edition of the COMMUNICATOR.)
We're going to form two cost containment committees. These committees will consider your cost saving ideas. They will also have the option to put more ideas on the table. We will ask them to recommend how we can best absorb this $4 million dollar reduction.
Who will serve on the committees?
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Administrators
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Teachers
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Classified staff
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Parents
Our intent is to let solutions come from all perspectives.
Once these two cost containment committees have independently reached their recommended way of reducing our budget deficit, a subgroup from each committee will come together to combine ideas into one prioritized list.
The joint recommendation will be explained to our district leadership team of school principals and some central office individuals. This leadership team will review the recommendation, make final recommendations to me, and I'll in turn make my recommendation to the board of education.
This will be a quick turn around. A lot of work has already been done in developing these ideas. When some of you are asked to serve on the cost containment committees, I hope you'll be willing to do so.
What we're doing right now
It's important to know that we are continuing to implement some cost-saving measures that we've already talked about.
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We're still continuing to save on utilities. Each one of us can try to save energy.
A few weeks ago a bus driver told me, "Col. Jones, every time I go by your office I look inside the window and I can see a lamp that's on. You tell us to turn those lamps off." My lamp is now turned off.
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The school system will use a four-day work week this summer consisting of four ten-hour days.
This will probably cover a period of five weeks. We anticipate for each Friday that all of our buildings are closed, we'll save between $8,000 and $10,000 in utility costs. While $50,000 of potential savings may not sound like much, it is equal to the salaries of 4 or 5 paraprofessionals or classified staff. We're taking this measure very seriously.
As always, if you have ideas of what we can do to save, please share them with me or with your supervisor. Hopefully you'll know somebody on one of these two cost containment committees, and you can share information with them as well.
We will be getting back to you soon so we can continue to finalize our plans for moving toward next school year. |
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