Friday, May 15, 2004

School board looking at using reserves By JOHN THOMPSON jthompson@TheCitizenNews.com For the second year in a row, the Coweta County School System may dip deep into its reserve to balance the budget. At this week’s Board of Education meeting, the board approved a motion authorizing Superintendent Peggy Connell to use $3.7 million in current reserve funds for the 2004-05 school budget. Board members Allan Payton and Brian Roy voting against measure. Public Information Officer Dean Jackson said the funds will be used for six items: • Additional special education teachers throughout the system ($896,000). • Adding teaching assistant for elementary keyboarding/typing ($100,000). • Keeping the current high school block scheduling: $2 million. Jackson said the school system had looked at modifying the current schedule, but decided to stay with block scheduling as long as they could. • Reinstating all elementary STOP program teaching assistants ($350,000). • Lowering first grade pupil-teacher ratios to 20:1 in at-risk (Title I) schools only ($384,000). • Lowering second grade pupil-teacher ratios to 20:1 in at-risk (Title I) schools only ($192,000). The $3.7 million comes from the system’s reserve of $6.3 million. Last year, the board used approximately $5 million in reserves to balance the budget. The Board of Education will make a final determination for the 2004-05 school budget in June.

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