Interesting article on oversized HUSD classrooms
I have talked with several parents who are deeply concerned about classes in some of our schools being overcrowded. Heck, I’m a parent with such concerns. My 6th grade daughter has a math class with something like 38 students in it. In most of the schools the kindergarten classes are the major issue with more children coming in than the district expected this year. Emily over at the AZ Republic wrote an interesting article on the subject recently. Here is a link to the article and here are some excerpts:
A huge influx of children in Higley’s elementary grades has led district officials to shuffle some elementary classes into bigger rooms and add new sections to even out class size.
Several parents worried the past two months that some of the youngest classes with more than 25 students are too big, interfering with learning and teachers’ classroom management.
…
Steve Nance, HUSD’s curriculum director for grades K-8,acknowledged parents were right to be concerned lately. He said, though, that changes have been made at these schools:
• Chaparral Elementary: Added a kindergarten section.
• Coronado Elementary: A fourth grade class was combined with another after the teacher agreed to take on a newly added section of kindergarten.
• Cortina Elementary: Added a kindergarten section.
• Gateway Pointe Elementary: Added a kindergarten.
• Power Ranch Elementary: Moved a kindergarten class into a larger classroom once used by the music teachers. Added a first grade section.
• San Tan Elementary: A third grade teacher agreed to lead a sixth grade section because of smaller-than-expected turnout in third grade and larger-than-expected turnout in sixth.
With all the changes, kindergarten sections now average about 25 students.
“Hopefully, we’ve stabilized for the year,” Nance said.
Concerned Parent:
My child attends Chaparral and is in a class of 29 kindergarteners. The numbers that we hear about class size are consistently inaccurate and misleading. This is the problem with data driven decisions. I am a firm believer that in addition to data, administrators need to walk through these classrooms, sit with teachers, and REALLY see what is going on.
Why do we put emphasis on an “average”? All this means is that those children sitting in classes beyond this average are ignored and cast aside. Why isn’t the district capping classes at 25? I am tired of hearing “budget” problems. The state pays the district for each day a child attends school. If our classes are busting at the seams, it seems to make sense that we would have more funding. Show me the money! Where is it going?
October 30, 2008, 3:17 pmGeoff Johnston:
You make a good point about using averages. If one class has 40 students and another has 10 the average (mean) is 25 but there is still a major problem. I think Greg mentioned this issue last night in his comments. Stats can be used to obscure reality as much as to expose reality so we have to be careful about that.
October 30, 2008, 3:29 pmGeoff Johnston:
Concerned Parent: The state pays the district for each day a child attends school. If our classes are busting at the seams, it seems to make sense that we would have more funding. Show me the money! Where is it going?
There is some merit to these claims. There is a lag between the student count and the funding the district receives. So in growing districts they usually are funded based on attendance the previous year or based on the previous 100-day head count. (I will post more specific details on this in the future because it is something I think all parents in the district would be interested in.)
October 30, 2008, 3:33 pmCharlie:
We know where some of the district funding has gone- to the salaries of the big wigs in HUSD.
There is a superintendent (who gets a raise each year no matter if she has performed well), and an associate superintendent (who just got a raise shortly after her contract was renegotiated, and a new pay scale was created for her position). There are at least half a dozen director positions (most of them newly created this fiscal year), which start at about 70K depending if they are director 1 or director 2. Also, when HUSD decided to give their employees a raise this year, all of the returning administrators received a step increase. New administrators (those hired after July 1) got a 2% increase.
Four of these are positions are in the Ciriculum department; 2 of which are direcor 2 spots . The HR department has a director 2 and several newly created positions like coordinator and project specialist. The SPED department now is led by a director 2, and also has a manager. The Business and Support Services department used to be headed by one executive director, now the department has been split into 2 departments, thus there are now 2 executive directors. They have also recently hired a warehouse manager for the shiney new warehouse they just built.
There is a director 1 and a director 2 in the Technology department, as well as a newly created Supervisor position. There is a new coordinator of Community Education. And don’t forget the director of the performing arts and her staff.
All of the mentioned positions are on the administrative salary schedule (not to be confused with the certified salary schedule that teachers get or with the classified schedule that the staff gets). Take a look on the HUSD website to see how much these positions make.
Not to mention all the benefits that the current board recently approved for these administrative employees. Each administrator has a life insurance plan, fully covered medical benefits for the employee AND the family, as well as a monthly gas allowance, (the super gets a company car) (and the administrators are not forced to drive the company vehicles which are available for employees for travel purposes). They also receive a company cell phone and lap top. Certain people even get to “work from home” a few days a week so they don’t have to make the commute across town.
October 30, 2008, 8:56 pmAnd of course, with all these new important people hired, they all need assistants.
Does anyone still need to know why we don’t have enough money for our kids’ educations?
dano:
Charlie
October 30, 2008, 9:08 pmYou forgot to mention that administrators also get 23 paid days of vacation each year, in addition to having off a week for spring and fall break. They also have the option to buy back up to 13 days of annual vacation. Their life insurance policy is for $250,000.00. Their medical insurance covers their families, but they can opt to have the yearly cost of the family premium placed into a TSA or added to their salary. Their car allowance is $2000.00 per year. The district also pays for their professional memberships.
Thanks
higteach:
Being a single mother of 2, earning a teacher’s salary, I can’t afford to add my kids to my HUSD health insurance, if I still want to be able to make the monthly house payment. I have to take my kids to the clinic and pray that they don’t get seriously sick. After reading about all the extras that these high earning administrators get, I think I am going to get sick.
October 30, 2008, 9:30 pmKeith:
I just recently learned of this website and have spent the better part of my evening reviewing all of the posts and must say that as a resident of the area it not only makes me angry but sad that my childrens education seems to be worth so little to this governing board. As I was about to call it a night and log off the computer, I got to read the most current statement by Charlie and Dano. I would like to know if these salaries and such are public knowledge and if so, where do I receive a copy of such. I am interested in those jobs. In todays economy, it would be nice to have such a high paying position for little productivity or accountability. While my wife and I work hard and live paycheck to paycheck, we go without so our children get by with only the necessities. We pay out almost $500 a month for health insurance and are lucky enough to get a 2 week paid vacation time, however we have not taken a real vacation since our honeymoon since we can’t afford such a luxury. We don’t get car allowance, we don’t get the option of working from home, so if a child is sick, we lose a days pay. We don’t get to take breaks when our children are off school so we must utilize our vacation days for such or rely on the kindness of family or friends to watch our kids. We don’t have assistants to do our work when we need help or are off, so the work must get done by us which means longer days or weekends if we need to make up the time.
I would like to see when exactly these people work and how many hours they are actually putting in so we can see what the hourly breakdown is. I would assume most of the people in the district office work monday through thursday since there are very few cars in the parking lot on Fridays.
October 30, 2008, 9:47 pmGreg Land:
I grew up with teachers for parents, I have some understanding of living on teacher salaries. We will never be able to pay teachers what they are worth. We are entrusting them with the care and education of our most valuable resources and our future. We need to pay them as much as we can and look at improving the work environment to help raise morale and possibly performance.
I think we also need to look at the issue of time off at breaks. Teachers are basically on a nine month contract and the breaks are factored into their contracts so the fall, spring and Christmas breaks are not an additional expense to the district. Administration positions are typically on 12 month contracts. I don’t know if the additional breaks are equivalent to additional vacation time at the district’s expense. Superintendent Lutry frequently states there is too much to do and not enough hours in the day to get everything done. I would think the time the schools are on break could be very productive and would have fewer interruptions.
October 31, 2008, 12:00 amCharlie:
I found some clarification for the Additional Benefits for Administrative Members:
Assistant Principals- 15 vacation days, vacation for Fall, Spring and Winter break, Life insurance of $200,000.
Principals- same
Executive Manager Performing ARts Center, Supervisors, Coordniators, Assistant Directors- Employee benefits equal to teaching certified staff, 15 vacation days a year, vacation for Fall, SPring, and Winter breaks, Life insurabce of $100,000.
Director 2- 23 vacation days, in addition Executive Administrators will take fall, spring, or one week at winter break. Life insurance of $200.000.
Executive Directors and Assistant Superintendents- 24 vacation days per year, in addition will take fall, spring, or one week at winter break. Buyback up to 13 days of vacation annually, car allowance of $2,000. Life insurance of $250,000.
All administrtators on this salary scale get covered medical benifits for themselves and their families (if coverage is declines they can opt to have equal amount of employee cost of premium added to a TSA or salary).
This should be public knowledge. It can be found on the HUSDs shared drive. I am sure the public can request this information from the HUSD HR Department or Governing Board secretary. I would assume it is readily available and would not take a week to prepare as some financial documentation has.
November 2, 2008, 9:28 amConcerned Parent:
Mr. Land,
November 6, 2008, 3:07 pmI have a sitter who teaches for the district so I would like to make a correction your statement about the nine month teaching contract. It is actually a 10 month contract. However, there is a week before and after school that is necessary to be present in order to prepare for those kiddos before they walk in the door. In addition, professional development is required to keep their certificates, so usually 1-2 weeks is spent in training over the summer months. After this, they do have about 6 weeks off.
bomber:
Just wanted to clarify, not all administrators on the administrative pay scale get medical benefits for thier families. Actually, the board recently took away family benefits from someone on the administrative pay scale.
November 13, 2008, 5:33 pmCharlie:
With all the administrations’ pay raises and other perks, I can’t say that I feel bad that one of HUSD’s top earners has to pay for his/her family members’ insurance. Join the club. And, if in fact, only ONE person’s insurance was taken away, and not everyone on that particular pay scale had to follow suite, then by all means, that person should let it be known. Leave it to Higley & the HR crew to change the rules after the game has already begun.
November 13, 2008, 6:21 pmRoxy:
Since we are talking about wages! What about those raises the 2 secretaries Cindy Walker and Jill Olivas received. Cindy Walker got bumped up to close to [Is this figure part of the public record? If so please show us where to find it before I allow salary numbers to be published - Editor] a yr and Jill got bumped up about [Ditto]. Okay so what is so special about these 2 secretaries they’ve only been working with the district for a couple of years. The other secretaries in the district only receive from $13.00 to $16.00 an hr.
November 17, 2008, 9:29 pm