Since last year, Jordan School District has had a decrease of another $13 million in the general fund. The total shortfall is now $33 million. A funding shortage has sent the district into a frenzy trying to fix the economic downfall.
At its board meeting on Jan. 5, the district discussed the different options to recover the loss of revenue.
Peggy Jo Kennett, the Jordan School District Board of Education president, said, “We are still gathering information on the survey online, then we are having our superintendent and business administration creates a sample budget that will be ready in the next month. We are not sure what will suffer the most from the loss till we get the sample survey and everyone’s input.”
According to the PowerPoint shown at the meeting, state funding was cut by $15 million, $8 million from the recent district split and another $10 million from additional decreases and budget changes. Jordan School District’s assessed evaluation has lost almost half of the money to the Canyons School District.
“The Canyons School District has a bigger tax face that generates more money per student, because of the split we now have less money to work with and less than we used to have,” said Kennet.
Budget options included layoff, roughly 200 employees, a tax increase that would cover $4 million and $20 million, be taken out of their rainy day funds, which can only be used for one time. They would have to soon after find an alternative to fill the bulk of their loss of funding.
Another option is to increase class sizes one to five students. It would save the district around $3.5 million to increase by one, $6.7 million to increase by two, $9.7 million increased to three, $12.5 to increase by four and at least $15 million to increase to five.
According to the Jordan School District website (www.jordandistrict.org), Jody Stubler, a district nurse, reminded the District at the Board meeting, “that a school nurse is the only staff member who is qualified to address student health concerns. [And] for some students, the school nurse is the only health professional they see. Each nurse in the District currently serves eight or nine schools.”
According to Principal Brad Sorensen, the Board of Education has not determined what they will officially do, but it should be decided at the end of March or early April.
RHS was given a “devised statistic” awareness that “our teacher loads are excessive, our overall number of students per teacher is over the limit,” said Sorensen. He said that, because RHS is now divided with Herriman High School. Teachers were asked to teach an extra period. Thirty-five teachers volunteered and will be given one conference period every other day.
“Because we knew we were splitting, we need our teachers to pick up a section here and there,” said Sorensen.
Money funding is determined by student population. After the school split, RHS will lose income which will affect the number of teachers, secretaries and janitors that RHS will be able to offer pay and benefits.
The Board of Education of Jordan School District will have an open, regular session on Feb. 24 at 7:00 to 7:20 p.m.
Please visit the Jordan School District website (www.jordandistric.org) to take their Budget Reduction Survey.