It’s become apparent that the math skills of embattled Superintendent Sal Corda are unsatisfactory. I think an individualized educational program is in order here. How else to explain the faith based budgeting numbers he dreams up, the excuses (then) that you just have to wait and see what the budget numbers are after the end of the school year, and not this latest example.
In a stunning, only for the timing, shocker, the enrollment projections that Crew Corda came up with in the summer are off. By a triple digit number in the high schools. It’s October, let’s start there. School started in August. We are now just hearing about the enrollment numbers. It’s almost as if Corda wants the public to believe that there was a sudden rush of parents that waited until September to enroll their kids into high school. Don’t they have computers there in the central office? Don’t they have someone capable of pressing that button to get a forecast based on enrollments that actually represents forecasts off actual data?
I hope that Sal “no central office administrator left behind” Corda is rethinking through the capability of his staff because they are sure making him look bad. But maybe he doesn’t see the clowns for what they are.
So let’s take a look at the enrollment numbers from Alexander Fenwick’s Norwalk Advocate article:
There are 136 more students than projected this year at Brien McMahon High School, where the number of freshmen enrolled jumped by nearly 100 students above estimates. Enrollment in other grades at McMahon remained fairly close to projections.
“We are in the process of trying to determine where those students came from,” Corda said. “There is a shift in the number of students who moved from the Norwalk High School side of town to the Brien McMahon side of town.”
At Norwalk High, enrollment was 76 students less then projected. Enrollment fell in every grade, with the biggest decline in the number of 10th graders, down 30 from projections, and 11th graders, down 25 students.
“When it comes to high school, it’s much shakier ground,” Corda said of predicting enrollment figures.
Enrollment figures in ninth grade are especially difficult to pin down, he said. The influxes and decreases may be attributed to former parochial school students enrolling in the public high schools, students switching to private schools or families moving across the district, among other factors.
Corda said he doesn’t yet know what this year’s high school enrollments mean for future projections.
“I don’t know yet whether that is an aberration or if it signals a trend for us.”
A little effort, since August, would have been able to target whether there was indeed a shift in the number of students who were once registered at Norwalk High School and then moved across town and “transfered” to Brien McMahon. I would guess that running a “transfer” report might yield that answer. A 10,000 record database would spew out this number in about 3 minutes including actual names. But this is Corda so let’s assume that someone would have to combine several databases to get the data.
District officials provided analysis of enrollment numbers at yesterday’s Board of Education meeting, describing jumps and drops in high school enrollment and elementary figures that prompted the hiring of one more elementary teacher than budgeted and a recommendation to hire an associate teacher in speech.
Board member Bruce Kimmel and Chairwoman Jody Bishop-Pullan questioned how funds are redistributed if schools fall a great deal short of enrollment projections or greatly exceed them.
“Over the course of time that balances out. We don’t say to a principal, we’re going to reduce your allocation,” Superintendent Salvatore Corda said.
Chief Operating Officer Stuart Opdahl said after the meeting that the district does have some leeway built into enrollment-based budgets and Corda said he would revisit the process.
Each July, the district puts about 10 percent of schools’ per pupil budgets in reserve, and in October the funds are redistributed based on actual enrollment, Opdahl said.
If schools are still lacking resources, principals can ask the Central Office for assistance.
“If there are hardships, problems are addressed,” Opdahl said.
Kimmel said it is important that school budgets be adjusted based on actual enrollment figures, otherwise, projections that overshoot real numbers could mean bloated budgets.
“You want an incentive for the projections to be as close as possible,” he said.
Projections are made by Central Office administrators based on attrition rates, or the average number of students lost or gained from grade to grade over five years, Corda said.
Is there really any question about what to do with budget numbers here? If different enrollments than what you projected are occurring, don’t you immediately revisit budget allocations? What is the budget, good ship Titanic, full speed ahead, ram the ice berg, stay on the ship till it sinks?
In May, Corda revealed his master budget strategy of overestimating everything so he could build a slush fund in order than he could move money around where he needed it. Now note what he is saying, “Over the course of time that balances out. We don’t say to a principal, we’re going to reduce your allocation.”
Will anyone please start holding Corda accountable?
source: Advocate, School board considers how to handle fluctuating enrollments, By Alexandra Fenwick, October 3, 2007
