Where does all the money go and why are these school officials and the Board of Education members not held accountable for money being wasted and kept from the classroom?

This past Monday, we had an internal School Community Council meeting at our Maui public school to vote on how to decrease our budget by $171,000 because of state cutbacks. We had to cut a teacher position (1st grade) and also a custodian among other positions. Next year we are to cut another 20 percent.

I don't understand if the principals are supposed to have control over their own budgets, according the state Act 51, why are they told how much is to be deducted from the budget for all of their salaries? They should have freedom to cut elsewhere.

And here is another mystery we’ve uncovered.

Out of the amount we receive with the Weighted Student Formula (approximately $4,000 per child) the teachers’ salaries are retained and paid by the state. The average pay retained per teacher is $79,131.00, and according to our research, a new teacher at our school starts at approximately $38,000-40,000.

Even calculating benefit costs, health insurance, sick leave, workers compensation and other benefits at approximately $10,000, then only $50,000 should be deducted.

For a seasoned teacher, the cost would be more like $65,000.

There is a discrepancy then of $15,000 to $30,000 per teacher (25 total), which adds up to at the low end of $375,000 extra removed from our budget. Where does this money go and how is it accounted for if it has already been “accounted" for within our school budget?

And that is not counting the discrepancy for the principal and vice-principal's salaries.

All of this "extra" money that they have taken from us could certainly make a world of difference to our school and ultimately our children – and the people we’ve had to layoff from our school. We also learned that there is a freeze on the SASA position (secretary to the principal or the school registrar).

Our registrar has been out on sick leave but we are still paying out of our budget for this salary.

In the future, we are not to hire for this position, but are still obligated to deduct the salary from our budget. And isn't this a mandatory position? Where will this money go? Then add all this strife to federal expectations through No Child Left behind, which mandates better performance by both our teachers and our students.

How are our schools supposed to achieve these goals without an allocation for the proper tools?

For example, elected state and federal officials want our students to be proficient in technology, yet we have no money allocated to our school for updated computers.

Now the federal government is adding standardized Science testing, yet we have no money allocated in our school for new science books.

Meanwhile our state senators and representatives are getting a record pay raise and new computers at the capitol at the same time we take more money away from our children who struggle with very old technology. The Board of Education is also looking at closing our smaller schools to cut back on expenses. That is an unwise idea. There are better ways to cut the budget.

I believe that in 2011 we can expect a school closure within our complex. Where will these children attend school? We are in overload in our cafeteria right now, each day we exceed the number of children allowed in the cafeteria by the fire code. Our Hawaii public educational system is a festering wound and if all we do is keep replacing the Band-Aid, we are doing a disservice to all our children. Something needs to be done to fix the core of the problem – poor management.

There is reportedly $14,000 per student allocated in the state budget – as much as Hawaii’s top private schools charge per student. But with billions of dollars allocated every year to our public schools, very little of that money is reaching the classroom and or used to enhance our children’s education. If we as parents wanted to go to the legislature and get a bill introduced, we wouldn't know where to begin or what to ask for. How do we fix our schools?

Act 51 in theory is supposed to do all these wonderful things to help with our broken system, yet it is not enforced. And the DOE leaders remain unaccountable for their financial wrong doings.

I would hate to hustle and get parents’ hopes up only to watch our hard work and efforts be ignored by impassionate, uncooperative and unaccountable DOE officials who don’t want change. They need to be held accountable. They need to explain, where is all the money and why isn’t it getting to the classroom? We are all ready to make something happen because we are so sick and tired of this and we are angry.

Lizabeth DeLaRosa-Walker, a resident of Maui, can be reached at mailto:ldw_2007@yahoo.com

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