Here is my problem. I was visiting Richmond VA recently for work and was talking with a parent there about local schools. There are programs in place to accelerate students work and support their efforts in math, sciences and so on. I'm talking things like a 7th grader studying 11th grade math. I'm talking things like all day pull outs for the child to go to a high school classroom (supervised). And the best we can do is a 1/2 day pull out where the kids are asked to 'think about this or that'. For the amount of money we are paying (which is about the same as VA I might add-I asked) our kids should be getting MUCH better.

Fayette has 22,232 kids. Richmond has 24,247; a difference of 2,015 students. Fayette’s budget is $197,132,660. Richmond’s is $269,217,496. A difference of $72,084,83. So they have about 2000 more students but spend over $72 Million more just on education than we do in Fayette. They also have revenue sources we do not. For example, the Sales Tax. You can check all this out for yourself! http://www.richmond.k12.va.us/indexnew/sub/Departments/
Budget_Reporting/documents/
09BoardsApprovedBudgetMarch32008.pdf Maybe they have more programs because they invest more in their kids’ education.

BTW - this is Henrico county not Richmond city. Turns out there are 48,245 kids in the county and the total budget is $508.8m. But put that into perspective. It works out to roughly $10,550 per student. Using the figures here - Fayette is roughly $8,900. That works out to an approximate differential of $37.3m or roughly a 18% change.

http://www.henrico.k12.va.us/administration/finance/budget.html

You don't know what you are talking about!

These things are mad difficult to evaluate deliberately! Everywhere.

If they get their money from numerous sources but only talk about one
at a time---they will lose you.

Only way to call them is to compare the total expenditures (if you can get that number) with previous years expenditure. I said TOTAL---no exceptions. Just try to get that!

But my comment was really about the composition of the spend. How much does a accelerated or gifted program take from whatever the total is. One figure was just slightly over $1m or roughly 1/2 of 1% and that's with acceleration support and a all day pull out program... Again, the point is how the kids are being short changed and the taxpayers are asked to dip into their pockets....again...

The funding for the Richmond VA gifted programs total up to 1.2m for 2009 projected - what is Fayette's expenditure?

Virginia uses lotto scam proceeds to fund only K-12 schools and not any higher education, which is where over 100mil of the City of Richmond's school funding comes from. GA could do similar if they eliminated HOPE entirely and in turn gave all the lotto money to K-12 schools.

If someone came to me talking about a program like that for Fayette county and told me that it would cost a budget increase of around 30% I'd think twice about it (until I looked at my children and envisioned the change it would bring about for them). The previous post makes a fair point on investment, but I'm not sure that if we put $72m into the system that we'd end up with similar programs.

And let's be clear - that is not what we are talking about with this situation. It is is a continuation of the current system as is. Which is disappointing.

I don't see a similar program being discussed for the funding - what I see is continued funding of the system that will produce kids that are behind once they are out of the system. To the point of this post - we put the money in higher ed, when in some respect it is too late. Thus shifting the education burden to those institutions rather than where it belongs.

Finally, there is an administrative factor here as well in that the teacher at the school in question here was seeking to put the child in advanced coursework as well as making it happen for the parent. The parent talked about the whole conversation taking maybe an hour and this was the 1st time they had met. The parent had taken it upon themselves to accelerate their child's education in the state they were moving from and that info was used in VA to continue that achievement. Please don't misunderstand, I'm not saying Fayette teachers don't care - I'm talking about the creation of an environment where kids are encouraged and supported to achieve.

See I don't mind paying for education. But this is a little crazy. How much is too much? I am not sure but as my Grandma said you can't get blood out of a turnip. Fayette county Shcool system where do you think we are gonna get it from. START CHARGING THE OUT OF COUNTY STUDENTS? I DON'T CARE WHY THEY ARE IN FAYETTE COUNTY SCHOOLS, IT COULD BE A FAMILY MEMBER WORKS HERE OR WAIT, YOU ARE A GREAT FOOTBALL PLAYER - GET YOUR PARENTS TO PAY THE DUES. SIMPLE HUH? I THINK IT IS AROUND $7000.OO+ A YEAR. IF FOOTBALL MEANS THAT MUCH THEN PAY THE DUES SO I DON'T HAVE TO PAY FOR A CLAYTON COUNTY FOOTBALL "HERO". WHATEVER.

Three on the BOE don't get it! We don't have any money! What is so hard to understand about that? If we don't have it, we can't give it to you!

You are right on about the out of county students. If the BOE would clean up their own act and get those kids out, our taxes would drop dramatically. One, will call you a racist if you complain. It isn't racist, if they don't live here, we shouldn't pay to educate them! But hey, that is her Yankee ideas, she no doubt feels with her lack of a college education, has come down here to enlighten the rest of us!