Wednesday, April 1, 2009
Paraprofessionals
There has been alot of discussion about whether or not first grade paraprofessionals will continue to be employed next year. This discussion had started prior to my becoming Superintendent. As the State budget for education continued to be cut, the school system had to develop ways to cut the budget - and I do mean, CUT! Three million dollars had to be cut during this school year and state revenues look even bleaker for next year. Administrators began making lists about ways to make these cuts. One of the many considerations which were brought to the table was that first grade paraprofessionals could be cut. They are all paid with local tax dollars. Muscogee County receives no state funding for first grade paraprofessionals. Although understanding their value, this was listed as one of the many sacrifices that may have to be made to balance the budget. As of this posting, we still do not have the revenue figures for State money for next year. I am hoping that due to the receipt of the federal stimulus money, we will not have to eliminate first grade paraprofessionals for next year. Unfortunately, SPLOST dollars cannot be used for personnel, only those items defined as capital projects. Let's all keep our fingers crossed!
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Dr. Andrews,
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the extraordinary effort you have put forth both before and after assuming the role of Superintendent of Muscogee County Schools. Education truly is the great equalizer offered to all children, teens, and adults of the United States of America and I am proud to say that my children attend Muscogee County Schools. The teachers, faculty, and staff take so much pride in serving our community. While I can say that my family fully supports future tax increases for the benefit of our schools, there is one area of education that worries me.
One of my children is currently serviced by the Gifted Education Program through St. Elmo School. It is an incredibly eye-opening program that encourages critical thinking and problem solving. My daughter's ideas have been enriched through many experiences she has had at St. Elmo, most recently through the field trip to Atlanta. This field trip was offered at a nominal cost to all appropriate aged children attending St. Elmo as a way to bridge the learning between classroom and real world experiences.
The students left at around 8:30 in the morning and traveled via a chartered bus to the King Tut exhibit in Atlanta. There the students got to see many artifacts from King Tut's reign. My daughter's most memorable artifact was the jewelry that she described as "unbelievably beautiful". This trip tied in the nine week intensive learning about Egypt many of the students had experienced, or were about to embark on, at St. Elmo.
The St. Elmo School, through the principal, faculty, and staff, provides my child with life-long learning experiences that cannot be tackled in daily classroom situations; however, it is not just through field trips that these epiphanies can occur. The environment that Libby Housand encourages from all of her staff members and students is incredibly warm, friendly, and engaging. Students that attend St. Elmo School are fed extra helpings of science, social studies, language arts, math, drama, and art. They return to their home schools each week to share the additional knowledge that they have been so fortunate to gain from St. Elmo. My concern for the future of St. Elmo stems from the massive budget cuts our County is faced with. Are there any planned budget cuts for the St. Elmo gifted program, that are currently on the table, for the upcoming school years?
Thank you for listening to our community,
Samantha Fuller
Can the new SPLOST or future ones be redefine so personnel salary can be included? A new schools, more technology and A/C in all gym will not be of great help to the kids if the teacher is stress out due to a larger class size, all the paper work and the lack of support from their supervisors and parents.
ReplyDeleteOne last question. If there's no money for personnel, how are we going to pay for the new teachers and staff for the new schools?
As a first grade paraprofessional in one of MCSD's schools, I applaud your dedication and desire to use stimulus money to retain our positions. You know how vital our jobs are to the success of these young lives. I have the privilege of working with some very creative, competent,and dedicated teachers. This includes not only the teachers I am assigned but all teachers in our building.
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoy working with this age student. In many ways, I feel as if I am an early intervention teacher benefiting the students as we evaluate and determine weaknesses in their learning. Each day is different! It is heart-warming to observe young children engage with a problem and really think about it. My job is extremely challenging and at times, I need to be a detective of sorts, trying to figure out, with the guidance of the classroom teachers and the Special Ed teacher, the best way to help our young children succeed.
I have one child attending my school, so feel more involved with their school careers since I’m there as well.
Another wonderful "perk" with this job comes the benefit of health insurance, something my husband and I have never had before. This benefit means more to me than my salary at times!
Thank you for keeping our positions in the forefront of your decision making. The children and first grade teachers would suffer without us there to support them.
I applaud what you are doing for our community, am so glad you are here, and will be a strong supporter of the SPLOST. Thank you for what you are doing to educate our community, to change the way others view our schools, and holding everyone from the top down accountable for my child's education.
Muscogee County is a great school system. I live out of the county, but I teach in Muscogee County and bring my children with me. My daughter loves attending school in this county. How close is the school district to making a decision about teachers paying the out of county tax to bring their children along. It would really help if we knew for sure so that we could make other arrangements for our families. We will not be able to wait until the last minute. Thanks for everything!
ReplyDeleteHello Mrs. Andrews
ReplyDeleteI am also a first grade parapro. I really do enjoy my job. I been doing this for many many years, and I would like to continue to do it. Like one parapro said the insurance is important. We would like to know about our jobs way before school is out so that we can figure out what to do. We would love to keep our job, we are always there for the children and if we are not there then who is going to help the ones who needs it when the teachers are busy with other things. We are there in the cafe. and watching other classes for the teachers can go to their meetings,take them outside,the first grade teachers need us for they can continue to teach and help the student exceed in life. I pray everynight that this will work out so we can continue helping the students and the teachers. Please let us know about our jobs. It's very important to us and our family. Thanks for everything.
We will let paraprofessionals know as soon as we can about their jobs. The budget is now on the Governor's desk and the money for stabilization in the stimulus package is under careful scrutiny to make sure Georgia spends it as it is intended.
ReplyDeleteIf parapro's are state funded....Why did you respond that the budget was on the governor's desk? Since we are county funded shouldn't we already know. We are very concerned about our jobs and feel that we will not be told until the last minute leaving us stranded with no jobs!!! Many of us are dependant on this job as well as the insurance. When will we know? We were told February, then March, then April...our principal is now telling us June. Haven't we been in the dark long enough?
ReplyDeleteI know that paraprofessionals are getting anxious about their positions. We are in the middle of developing the budget. We still have not received a final state allotment sheet. Without that we do not know what the final revenue picture will be. Also, the legislature passed a bill to freeze property tax assessments for this year. Even though Muscogee County has a freeze on property taxes, the school district has been able to take advantage of the increases in the total digest that have occurred annually. With this bill, those increases will be almost non-existent; however, the Governor hasn't signed that bill yet so we don't yet know what kind of a percentage increase in local money we should project. The salary for kindergarten paraprofessionals is funded mainly by the state with some local money paying benefits. Paraprofessionals who work with students with disabilities are paid with some federal money and some local money. First grade paraprofessionals are paid with all local money. To develop a budget, you must know what your revenue is going to be - in the school business, that is a combination of federal, state, and local money. Then, you compare your budget requests with your revenue. Just as in your home budgets, the requests are always above the revenue! Then, you must determine what to cut, to do without, to trim, in order to balance the budget.
ReplyDeleteI know paraprofessionals are anxious, as I have stated, but we are really trying to get this budget balanced without doing away with a whole group of employees - like first grade parapros. Please be patient with us. It is a long and tedious process and we are trying to be very careful in our projections. I promise you, as soon as I am comfortable with the balancing of the budget, I will let you know my recommendation. Of course, the final budget must be approved by the Board of Education. They have all expressed their desire to keep the paraprofessionals . . . so hang on just a little while longer.
The reason I made the statement about the budget being on the Governor's desk is because we will not get our final allotment sheet until the Governor signs the budget.
What am I not seeing? We need to cut 3 million out of the state budget.......and first grade paras are paid out of local tax dollars ...how does that save us money from the state? I am a SPED teacher...I was just wondering. Where do the monies for SPED paras come from?
ReplyDeleteIf $3 million dollars is cut out of the State budget, at least some of this money must be replaced because there are some critical needs that must be funded. The only place that money can be "found" is in the local budget. When you replace state money that is not funded with local money, then you have to give up something in the local budget - that something may be first grade paraprofessionals. That decision has not been made yet. Because we are getting federal stimulus money, it is possible that the state money that is being reduced can be replaced with the federal stimulus money; thereby, leaving the local money to continue to fund first grade paraprofessionals. Think of the budget as a puzzle that must be put together. The main questions are what are our basic and essential needs and from pot of money can the funding for these needs come? Much of the state and federal money are so very heavily regulated that what you can spend that money on is specifically dictated with very little flexibility. The money for Special Education paraprofessionals come from federal money, specifically Title VI-B. Hope this clarifies things a little for you.
ReplyDeleteMrs. Andrews
ReplyDeleteAny news about parapro's and their jobs.....It's coming down to the end of the year........