City system struggling to deal with state cutbacks
“We will try to cut a lot of things before we start cutting teachers,” Superintendent Dee Fowler said.
Statewide, legislators budgeted $300 million less for education than they did last year. This leaves school administrators throughout the state scrambling for ways to cut back without cutting teachers while still finding ways to fund new teacher units.
“I think passing the education budget allowed our school districts to rehire and not have any non-tenured teachers let go because of our failure to pass the bill,” Griffith said.
Alabama funding of teachers for a particular school system is based on the number of students that school system had the year before. This causes a problem with fast-growing systems, such as Madison’s. The state used to correct this by allowing school systems to employ teachers, then prove those teachers were needed, with the state reimbursing the cost. The state did away with that provision this year.
Last year, the Madison School System received $1.2 million under that provision. It won’t be receiving any this year. This means Bob Jones High School, with more than 2,000 students will not receive any new teachers this year.
Another problem is this year’s budget cut the funding for transportation by 4 percent. The school system will still have to run busses to ensure that kids can get to school, but they will have to find the money somewhere on the local level to pay the cost.
This is especially difficult due to the constantly rising gas prices.
“Nobody is saying that Madison is not growing, they’re just saying the education budget is not,” Fowler said.
