SOME THOUGHTS ON THE 2024 SUPERINTENDENT BUDGET PROPOSAL:

(See the FY2025 Superintendent Budget Proposal Presentation HERE)

Now that the Superintendent has proposed his budget, we can advocate for specific items that we would like to see put back in (or added) before it goes to a City Council vote. Here are some talking points that might be useful as you weigh in at public meetings and email the school board and city council members. 

If you have thoughts and information on this budget, please EMAIL US and we will add your thoughts to this page.

What seems good (especially from an elementary school perspective):

  • 5 specials/5 teacher prep times promised for each elementary school 

  • Good investments in the reading curriculum (Reading Interventionists) and a plan for a Reading Intervention Curriculum.

  • School-based special ed coordinators

Concerns:

  • The superintendent’s budget eliminates the entire curriculum team with the exception of the Wabanaki Studies/Black History Lead Teacher. For the last seven years, the district’s leadership included a position directly under the superintendent focused on academics (formerly the Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning, now the Deputy Superintendent). The superintendent’s budget eliminates that position. That means the superintendent’s Executive Team—the top decision makers in the district— will be leaders whose core focus and expertise is in finance, strategy, elementary schools, and secondary schools, not teaching and learning.

  • The superintendent’s budget eliminates the entire elementary math specialist and intervention team in addition to the district systems that supported them. These cuts will have a disproportionate impact on our most marginalized students. Already, there’s a 30-point  gap between white students and Black and Latinx students on standardized math testing (NWEA). Right now, every elementary school has one or more math specialists who work with teachers to learn and master the curriculum. In addition, because our schools don’t have separate math interventionists to work with students who need more help to learn grade-level content, our math specialists also serve as math interventionists. They manage math interventions, plan instruction, work with teachers on the interventions, train ed techs, and work directly with students. Ideally, each school would have a math specialist and a math interventionist. Right now, our math specialists on average spend 40% of their time working as interventionists. As a result, the superintendent’s eliminates all support for elementary math.

  • Math becomes a priority again in the district’s draft strategic plan in two years. PPS has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in launching the Illustrative Math curriculum, and if the district dismantles math capacity, it will have to start from scratch when the district makes math a priority again—which will be challenging and expensive, as it took several years and a large investment of time, money, and resources to build up the high-capacity specialist and intervention team. It can’t be recreated quickly.

  • The superintendent’s budget eliminates the position in the curriculum department responsible for the field work components of the Wabanaki curriculum, such as field trips to the Presumpscot River, which are core to the Wabanaki curriculum.

Possible Funding Solutions to Investigate:

  • MaineCare reimbursement for eligible services (like the BREATHE program) have provided funding in the past and has not been investigated for this budget.

  • Some ideas, like a local option tax and changing the school funding formula, are long term goals. As such, there is an argument for tapping the reserve funds for a greater share of the budget this year and next year, until those alternative revenue sources are online and the ~$2.5m pension bond is off the books for FY '27.

Possible Talking Points:

“We encourage the Board to thoroughly review the Superintendent's Budget to restore funding for areas that build on long term investments the District has made that impact academics and community partnerships. We also encourage the Board to restore Math Specialists, classroom teachers, Ed tech positions, and others which have a direct impact on student success. The Board should look to find additional revenues for additions to the budget, such as MaineCare reimbursement, and if necessary tap into reserve funds to provide stability as the District goes through this year of structural transitions.”