by Carrie Moritz, Gazette
On March 8, the Garretson School Board passed a $350,000 opt-out resolution, and on May 11, it will be put to a vote. At that time, the public can voice whether they agree the school can keep taxes where they've been for the past two years, or if they want the current opt-out to expire. On Tuesday, March 23, the school held an informational meeting about the Opt-Out.
In 2016, the school's General Fund was in dire straits. Normally, the school needs to keep a General Fund reserve of at least 18% in order to continue paying bills in between the two tax disbursements that occur each year. Back in 2016, the school was close to spending far enough into their reserve that a possibility of needing to lay off staff or even close the school's doors was brought into the discussion.
The opt-out resolution for $500,000 passed at that time, with a mandate from the community that the school work hard to turn those numbers around by the end of the opt-out's five years. In return, the school asked the community to work towards growth and improvement, so more students would be attracted to the school.
In 2016, Superintendent Guy Johnson noted that 100 new students would be needed within the next five years in order to close that gap. Over the next four years, numbers were trending in a positive direction, adding nearly 32 new students to total enrollment numbers. In 2020, after the school opted to open in August after the pandemic closed their doors for almost six months, enrollment numbers dropped back down to nearly 2016's baseline. Enrollment has since rallied some, but that won't count toward next year's budget.
"We're no longer at a crisis point, we just want to keep the district in a stable financial position and keep the district growing," said Superintendent Johnson during an opt-out informational meeting that was held on Tuesday, March 16. While not at a crisis point, he said, neglecting to pass the opt-out could bring the school back to where it was in 2016, looking to reduce staff or not having funds for preventative maintenance. While he doesn't believe the school will need to ask for the entire amount of the opt-out over the next two years, the school board wants the option in order to ensure any potential shortfalls would be covered.
Only about 20 people were in attendance at the meeting, though it was also streamed over the Alliance public channel and has been posted to YouTube. Questioning of local residents by the Gazette found most potential voters to be apathetic or against voting for the measure, but none were willing to go on record. Letters to the Editor both for and against are welcome.
Both Superintendent Johnson and School Board President Shannon Nordstrom are working to make an argument towards continuing the opt-out. In the meeting, they pointed out where the school has worked to reduce spending, including moving the school lunch program to a contractor instead of keeping it "in house" as it was prior to 2017. This has reduced costs substantially, to the tune of over $90,000. Another significant cost is the preschool program, which the school subsidizes. They were able to decrease the program cost to $25,698.87 in 2019 through tuition raises, but the school shut down in March 2020 spiked costs again as tuition was waived for the final months of the school year. They also reduced costs by bringing an end to some rental contracts (such as janitorial supplies like rags and mops) and by upgrading the school's lighting system to LED's. These did have large upfront costs, but the school estimates that those areas will save $5,000-10,000 a year each over the next 8-10 years.
Eighty percent of the general fund costs go towards salary and benefits for teachers and staff, leaving 20% for other costs. Without an increase in the General Fund, the school could potentially have to look at reducing staff by combining or eliminating classes.
"Ultimately, the goal is to treat people well, and provide a good program for them so they want to come to school here in Garretson," said Superintendent Johnson.
The goal in 2016 was just to maintain programming, not to grow it. At this time, the school is implementing a new reading curriculum for third through fifth grades. They plan to implement a new curriculum for kindergarten through second grades next year.
President Nordstrom pointed out that in his opinion, the ultimate goal should be to continue to improve and grow programming throughout the entire school, not just maintain the status quo. This could include bringing in more offerings for students, along with implementing higher-skill courses.
Since 2016, the school district also started new skill testing. One test, the National Career Readiness Certification, had 58.5% of high school students earning a Platinum or Gold rating. The state average is 41.3%.
In other tests, the student population tests at or slightly above state average, especially in Language Arts, where students consistently test higher than the state average.
"We think we still offer a solid academic program for our students," said Superintendent Johnson.
With 80% of the general fund going towards salaries, one of the biggest questions posed is whether reducing salary costs is a viable option.
At a starting teacher salary of $40,000, Garretson is only above Dell Rapids in starting salary if compared to other Minnehaha County schools. Brandon School District offers a starting salary of $48,271 and Baltic offers $40,880. West Central, Canton, Beresford, Harrisburg, and Tea vary between those two numbers. (The most recent starting salary found for Flandreau, 2017, was $37,500.)
Superintendent Johnson and President Nordstrom argued that keeping salaries competitive is required. Currently, there is a teacher shortage in South Dakota, and if Garretson cannot keep a competitive salary, other school districts will be able to lure away good talent.
"Geographically, we're pretty lucky," Superintendent Johnson said. "People want to live in the southeast part of the state of South Dakota... We've been able to hire pretty quality teachers to come here and work with our kids."
If teacher salaries cannot be reduced, the next logical question is whether administrative costs can be cut or if the district can become more efficient.
Superintendent Johnson argued that Garretson School District is already doing a very good job with administrative costs, ranking #6 out of 21 schools with similar population sizes in South Dakota. Each administrator wears several different hats, such as Assistant Activities Director, Special Education Director, Coach, and Bus Driver as part of each of their duties. Baltic, which is similar in size to Garretson, has the same number of administrators.
"Our commitment is that we're going to do what needs to be done to make our school run," said Superintendent Johnson.
As far as efficiency goes, the school ranks 119 out of 149, with the higher number being the most efficient. This is the cost to the school in order to educate one student, and places Garretson in the top 20%. This means that while there may be a few more ways to be more efficient, it's already doing well.
When asked what would happen if the opt-out does not pass, Superintendent Johnson noted that for the next two years, the school district would be okay. There is currently a large positive balance in the General Fund due to COVID-relief funding. However, he said, it is not sustainable long-term, and the school could be back where it was at in 2016 within a few years.
"The school is still deficit spending in its General Fund," said Nordstrom.
"Sometimes people forget, we're about that size of school that's the wrong size," said audience member Oran Sorenson. Thirty kids in one class without splitting them up are too many, but then each class is 15, 16 kids, which can seem like too few, he pointed out.
"We applaud your efforts for trying to make it work," Sorenson said.
Maintenance of the current school facilities was also addressed. At this time, the newest school facilities are twenty years old, and the Athletic Complex is overdue for maintenance and repairs. While the bulk of maintenance, repair, and upgrade costs come from the Capital Outlay Fund, repairs on the track and field, which will cost upwards of $1.5 million, could be threatened if the school needs to use the Capital Outlay Fund in order to help the General Fund.
The school has been fairly limited in how they're allowed to use the COVID-relief funds, said Superintendent Johnson. For instance, the first round went towards PPE and upgrades needed to modify classrooms. The second round could go towards ionizers and the replacement of windows and doors, but the bulk of those funds will likely go towards student remediation (addressing any loss in learning) and addressing students' mental health. The school has been allotted two years to spend those funds.
Garretson was in a good place and transitioned really well when the start of the pandemic happened, Nordstrom pointed out.
"This crew was really ready. It took a week to put a plan together," Nordstrom said. "We had the stuff here, we were already in a good position to make our moves. We should be proud of that.
"If we can continue what we've been doing- this isn't a new opt-out- with the community support, this is a continuation of what we've been doing... we can continue to work on improving the district without having the big setbacks," he continued. "The town has to continue to have growth, and the district has to continue to be smart about what we do."
The public vote for the measure will be held on May 11. Final details will be released closer to the date. A document with frequently asked questions, and a link to the full video of the meeting, can both be found at the Garretson School District website at https://garretson.k12.sd.us.
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