LOSERS

• Home Schooled Children -- Home school children were denied participation in extra-curricular activities at public schools. The DOE arbitrarily denies home school students equal access absent a Board of Education policy.

• Charter School Students – Ways & Means Chair Roz Baker and House Finance Chair Marcus Oshiro insist that charter schools are getting a budget increase while other departments are suffering a decrease. Both Baker and Oshiro fail to mention that the conversion of Kamaile Elementary and the projected increase of 1,000 new charter school students mean that per pupil funding will be approx. $7,000 next year instead of the current $8,000 per pupil funding.

• Employees’ Retirement Fund -- $1.6 million was taken from this fund for charter schools when the DOE refused to give up any of the $43.6 million general fund carryover.

• Regular Public Schools – While the public will spend nearly $15,000 per pupil by fiscal year 2009, 93 percent of those funds will continue to be controlled by the state and district-level DOE, despite Act 51 passed in 2004 requiring 70 percent of the DOE’s operating budget to be spent by the schools.

• Taxpayers – The citizens of Hawaii continue to shoulder the burden of exploding costs of a statewide school system, including over $1 billion for administration, $772 million for teacher salaries and $600 million for weighted student funding for schools. A system that employs more administrators and other personnel than classroom teachers might more aptly be named the “Department of Employment” rather than the “Department of Education.”

• Public School Teachers – As the session began, Hawaii State Teachers Association President Roger Takabayashi proposed that taxpayers foot the bill for new homes for teachers in the name of recruitment and retention. In the end, the Legislature did not provide any new housing allowances for teachers. Instead, it appropriated $5 million to state and district administration (EDN300) to solicit grants for “professional development” schools (i.e. hiring teachers to teach teachers), further diluting general funds for increased classroom teacher pay.

• Small schools – A commission will determine which schools with small student populations will be recommended for closure. This law directly contradicts the Board of Education’s Small School policy. The law does not include a requirement for an analysis of small schools converting to charter schools. Also, it does not require an analysis of the many buildings, schools and offices used by the state and district DOE and costs associated with those operations.

• Regular Public Education Students – 2007 SAT scores in reading and math hover at 484 for reading and 506 for math -- well below national averages. Hawaii’s public school students scored the same in 1995 as in 2007. The Legislature has continually killed legislation that would require the DOE to adopt a standardized curriculum.

• Needy Families – $400,000 in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) will be spent on after school programs, even though the DOE carries a $6.3 million balance in federal after school funding.

WINNERS

• DOE bureaucracy -- The Legislature appropriated an additional $20 million per year as a recurring cost item. This budget increase means that the DOE bureaucracy will not have to cut spending for upper and middle management.

• Contractors –- $310 million was added to the DOE’s budget (EDN100) and $161 million to the University of Hawaii’s budget for construction improvements. The State Educational Facilities Improvement special fund (SEFI), created in 1989 and due to sunset this year, was extended this session. The SEFI allows 90 million dollars to be appropriated to a special fund for construction and repair and maintenance of schools. Since 1994, over $2 billion has been appropriated to this special fund, and yet only $356 million of the total has been allotted to date, with only $291 million encumbered by DOE to be spent on school improvements. The balance remains on the state’s books under Budget & Finance 101 (BUF101).

• DOE Slush Fund -- The DOE budget includes $255 million in federal funds and $43.6 million general fund carryover this year.

• Substitute teachers –- After suffering lower pay than required by law, which the DOE ignored for several years, $800,000 is included in the budget for substitute teachers, to bring their pay into conformance with the law. A lawsuit seeking $16 million in substitute teacher back pay has not been resolved.

• United Public Workers (UPW) -- $2.4 million - triple the amount provided for substitute teachers – was appropriated for substitute custodians. And yet, school restrooms still do not have soap or paper towels.

The Legislature could have helped solve Hawaii’s education crisis by simply enforcing its own law requiring 70 percent of the DOE’s operating budget to be spent by the schools.

Both the Legislature and the Board of Education fund the DOE’s categorical programs, which include costs for non-school level personnel, and each program increases with each collective bargaining agreement increase, whether the program is essential or effective or not.

For example, the program “Electricity” is housed at the district-level. The cost for schools’ electricity cannot be determined, because district personnel costs to administer the program (i.e. pay the bills) are included in the total.

The DOE Chief Financial Officer cannot provide school-level operating costs, because the DOE’s budget is top-down and not bottom-up. Therefore, the DOE’s budget will continue to grow and non-classroom personnel will continue to increase, leaving less money for teachers’ salaries and less money for schools.

These conditions will lead to the continued exodus of students and teachers from public schools. The public will be left funding principals teaching principals and teachers teaching teachers, but few will be left to teach students. In the end, some say that everyone will lose, including legislators, when the public finally declares that “enough is enough.”

Laura Brown is the education reporter and researcher for Hawaii Reporter and served as a legislative aide for Sen. Sam Slom this 2008 session. Reach her at mailto:laurabrown@hawaii.rr.com

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