Category: Blog

Have a question, comment, or concern about the Hartford Public Schools and City of Hartford (CT) education budget?

Update: On Wednesday, May 4, 2016, there will be a meeting where the City Council and the Hartford Board of Education speak on the proposed budget. (Here are the other meetings for City Council.) The final budget vote will happen on Tuesday, May 17 at 5:30 p.m. at Naylor Elementary School on 639 Franklin Avenue. 

On May 3, 2016, there was a budget hearing for public comment on the Hartford Public Schools recommended budget for the 2016-17 school year. The hearing started at 5:30 p.m. at the M.D. Fox Elementary School at 470 Maple Avenue in the city’s Barry Square/South End neighborhood.

Update: It was a brutal board of education public hearing on the budget. Speakers were very frustrated for a variety of reasons: lack of resources & funds, layoffs, school closures, & lack of responsiveness. The Hartford Courant account is here and the video of the public hearing on May 3, 2016 is here.

You can read the recommend budget here and check out the resource links below. You can also send me or post a question about the budget on this site.

The news is not good. The HPS Superintendent has proposed severe cuts to the school budget: a total cut of 235.8 full-time positions. (A list of cuts by people’s positions with the schools is below.)

So what’s my take?  “Arbitrary austerity” makes planning budgets on the ground level very difficult, but a few other things are happening at the same time:

• Costs continue to go up over time, but revenue is flat.
• The City of Hartford continues to flat fund the school system and pressure the school board to assume a greater portion of costs.

City of Hartford Proposed Education Budget FY2017

• Expansion of academies, charters, and magnets across the region has everybody fighting for a flat pool of students, leaving some schools “under-enrolled”. (See this post for more information on this issue.)
• A number of private foundation grants will be reduced next year. The promises made with these grants do not go away, however. (e.g. Nellie Mae)
• Support from the State (Governor and Legislature) is declining or flattening in a number of areas such as special funds/grants. (e.g. Education funding for municipalities, magnet funds, Alliance grants.)

Source: CT Mirror, Budget Tracker, 2016.

 

Resource Links:

A Conversation on SBB School Funding in Hartford, by Robert Cotto

Budget Tracker, What’s on the Table So Far, CT Mirror.

Democrats’ Education Cuts Fall Heavily on CT’s Gold Coast, by Jacqueline Rabe Thomas, CT Mirror.

Impact of the Governor’s, Republican, Democratic, Proposed FY17 Budget on Children and Families, by CT Voices for Children.

Hartford Public Schools, Superintendent’s Recommended Budget 2016-17.

How the Proposed Budget Cuts Affect Your Town, by Matthew Kauffman, The Hartford Courant.

Mayor’s Recommended Budget FY17, City of Hartford

Proposed Hartford Schools Budget Would Eliminate 235 Full-Time Positions, by Vanessa de la Torre

Update: On December 29, 2016 (between Christmas and New Year’s Eve), the CT Mirror reported that the Malloy administration would cut education cost sharing and municipal aid grants (capital improvement) mid-way through the year. The largest education grant (ECS) cuts will most directly impact public schools in more affluent towns, while the cuts to municipal aid (capital improvement for things like street, building, school repairs, and the like) cut more deeply in the cities. In addition to cutting education funding for public schools, cuts to capital improvement grants in the cities (Bridgeport loses $2.4 million, Hartford loses $1.9 million) will also impact local education budgets and public schools indirectly. Municipalities and school districts will have to decide on how and what to cut mid-year, a difficult challenge, since raising more revenue mid-year is unlikely if not impossible. This was an unusual and likely unprecedented mid-year cut in ECS and municipal. This comes on the heels of the Malloy administration (CT SDE) requesting applications for new privately-managed charter schools and charter schools facilities grants earlier in the week. These new mid-year, holiday-season cuts added to previous cuts to ECS funding during the 2016 legislative session reported here.

For Dianne

As we face what CT Voices for Children recently described as “arbitrary austerity”, there are new battles for State education funding that would have seemed unimaginable only a few years ago. The CT Mirror recently reported that the Connecticut Governor’s revised budget would cut all Educational Cost Share (ECS) funding to 28 wealthy towns and would cut a portion of funding from 111 other towns in Connecticut. I have a number of questions and concerns about cutting all or some of the ECS for these towns, even if they are middle income or very wealthy towns.

In order to make ECS work politically, it’s important to make sure every town and city gets something along a progressive scale – even if it’s a minor amount. After the Horton v. Meskill lawsuit, legislators in the 70s and 1980s were forced to acknowledge that the State was ultimately responsible for providing public education and that there was an over-reliance on local property taxes to pay for public education as guaranteed by the State.

The grant program they created eventually became the Educational Cost Sharing and today it provides funding to every town and city on a progressive basis, that is to say that each town receives a grant that is based on their ability to pay for their schools. The idea is that the State helps pay for public education in addition to local funds generated from property taxes in order “share the costs” of providing public education.

For some towns and cities, the ECS funding from the State is the largest single source of school funding, and for others the grant is supplementary to local revenue. Ideally, every town and city gets some state funding along a progressive scale, which is added to local funding generated from regressive property taxes. However, as the CCJEF case and attorneys like Wendy Lecker argue, the problem with the ECS grant is that it is largely underfunded to provide an adequate education to all students in Connecticut and the method of determining the amount of funding is not progressive or rational enough to be equitable.

So here are some of my questions and concerns.

By cutting and reducing grants for these wealthy and middle income towns and flat funding the 30 lowest income, Black and Latino districts, does this set up the Educational Cost Sharing as only a supposed “low-income, Black & Brown program”?

Does the ECS grant program then become more politically vulnerable in the future without all towns and cities getting aid, thus undermining the broad support it enjoys from all towns and cities in CT?

As my wife, Dr. Cotto, pointed out, there are white, Republican legislators from wealthy towns fighting for ECS funds alongside white, Black, and Latino legislators from the cities. It’s not everyday that there is near universal support in the legislature on a particular program or grant, particularly for public education.

Also, if the idea of the ECS is to base funding on a progressive, rational basis, then what rationale is there for an arbitrary elimination or cut of this funding for some towns and cities?

As my former colleague, Orlando Rodriguez, argued several years ago, there are problems with the exact components of the ECS formula along with its funding and implementation. Specific issues include the fact that some towns and cities are underfunded and overfunded based on past formulas set by the legislators. In short, the Legislature has made somewhat progressive formulas for allocating the ECS grant, but never funded it fully, nor cut anybody that should have received less (e.g. hold harmless). Arbitrary cuts don’t fix any of these problems.

Finally, cutting all or part of ECS funding for these very wealthy towns can be interpreted as a backdoor tax increase to those towns. Here’s why: If these towns want to maintain their current overall spending on education, they might have to raise local property taxes when these State cuts happen. I understand that there may not be a lot of sympathy for wealthy towns having to raise already low property tax rates, albeit in a roundabout way of cutting State education or municipal aid. I get it.

Thinking ahead, take as an example State Representative Gail Lavielle (R) from Wilton, who is a member of both the Appropriations and Education Committees. Will arbitrarily eliminating all State ECS funds to a wealthy town like Wilton make Representative Lavielle more or less likely to support State public education spending in the future, particularly the ECS grant?

This budget proposal to cut out or reduce wealthy and middle income towns from ECS funding on an arbitrary basis departs from the concept of progressive, rational cost sharing for public education. Will legislators and residents of Fairfield, Greenwich, Wilton, and similar towns have even less a reason to care and fight for public education in other parts of the state, having nothing to fight for in terms of ECS funding at the State level? My worry is that the next time, when they come for funds in the rest of our school districts, the ones that enroll low and middle-income White, Black, and Latino schools, we will be even more on our own to fight for those ECS dollars to fund public education and our schools.

The Hartford Public Schools uses a very unusual funding system called “student-based budgeting” (SBB). In other districts across the country, they use the term “weighted student funding” (WSF) rather than SBB.

Many Black and Latino majority school districts are moving towards this funding scheme and with scant evidence that “SBB/WSF” improves overall resources, equity, or educational outcomes. Based on my experience here in Hartford, CT, I have my doubts on this “voucher-like” funding system.

The New Haven Public Schools want to move to a similar school funding system as Hartford and other cities across the country. In this video interview, I sit down with Chris Willems and Jill Kelly to discuss my experience and concerns with student-based budgeting in Hartford so they can learn how it might work (or not) in New Haven. I also propose some criteria for a fairer funding system. Below there are links to SBB and WSF in Hartford, New Haven, and elsewhere.

Here are a few quotes from the interview:

• Under this model, “many of the principals find that they don’t have enough money for all of the things that they used to be able to provide.”
• “More than anything else, weighting student funding and the school-based budgeting provide kind of the illusion of equity.”
• “We have to ask the question: why is it that the Black and Latino, and relatively poorer school districts, are being asked to do these really unproven and somewhat exotic reforms in terms of school funding, rather than saying that we should be getting the funding from the state and the local, and the federal government as well, to provide the sorts of educational opportunities that are available in the suburbs?”

Resources on “SBB/WSF” Funding

“Student-based Budgeting” in Hartford:

Guide to Student-Based Budgeting

“Weighted Student Funding” in New Haven:

Ed Board Seeks Change to School Funding, Aliyya Swabby.

SBB and WSF in Other Cities:

Jill Kelly: Arguments Against WSF

Other articles on SBB:

Several months ago, former Hartford school board member Dr. Shelley Best posted a photo of herself with a handful of white teachers and an administrator in the background. Dr. Best, a Black woman, took the “selfie” photo at a district workshop about the “achievement gap”. In the caption of her Facebook post with the photo, she commented, “In a room full of folks talking about us (and the educational achievement gap) that don’t look like us … hmmmm …”

The Hartford Courant wrote a story months after the event and focused on one of the white teacher’s hurt feelings about being captured in the photo frame and Dr. Best’s protest. This led to a brief, but intense, flurry of essays about teacher diversity, white folks missing the point, personal defenses, and a reprimand of Dr. Best. Looking at some basic staffing data, an important question adds to Dr. Best’s concern – where did the Black and Latino/a teachers in Hartford go?

When Dr. Shelley Best wondered where all the Black educators were during the workshop several months ago, she was on to something troubling. The Hartford Public Schools has steadily lost Black and Latino/a teachers over the last decade, while adding white teachers during the same period.

Source: CT State Department of Education, 2015

Public staffing data provided by the State Department of Education (CEDAR) shows that the Hartford Public Schools lost a substantial percentage and number of Black and Latino/a teachers from 2004-12. In 2004-05, 15% of all Hartford teachers were Latino/a and 15% were Black. In 2012-13, roughly 10% of all Hartford teachers were Latino/a and 10% Black. In other words, a net total of 155 Black and Latino teachers disappeared from HPS, while the district added 95 new white teachers. As a result, the proportion of white teachers in the whole district rose from 68% to 77% from 2004-12.

With this limited information, it’s not entirely clear why HPS has lost so many Black and Latino/a teachers. The state’s public staffing data does not tell us about the on-the-ground factors that might “push” and “pull” teachers of color into and out of the profession (Irizarry & Donaldson, 2012). The public staffing data doesn’t reveal whether these Black and Latino/a teachers in Hartford experienced layoffs, were pushed out/fired, retired, found other more lucrative or fulfilling work, or were promoted to other positions in Hartford or elsewhere.

In the case of the Hartford area schools during this period (2004-12), there were also unusual policies and factors that could have led to this steep disappearance of teachers of color. These unusual events and policies included the great recession, expanded public school choice programs in the Hartford region, and assorted neoliberal education reforms. These factors could have impacted the entry and exit of Black and Latino/a teachers from the Hartford Public Schools.

The great recession, caused by the near collapse of the banking industry, resulted in teacher layoffs/reductions in force through the capitol region. These school districts in the capitol region included 35 town-operated school districts around the City of Hartford, which is associated with the Hartford Public Schools. The largest declines in the number of teachers of all racial/ethnic groups in these districts happened from 2008-09 to 2009-10 and from 2009-10 to 2010-11.

Interestingly, the capitol region school districts never rebounded in terms of adding back lost teachers (from 2004-12), but Hartford did rebound and in a very different way. After the banking collapse, HPS added white teachers even as it continued to lose Black and Latino/a teachers. On the other hand, the other 35 capitol region districts added a smaller number of Black and Latino/a teachers (mostly the latter) even while continuing to decline in overall, particularly in the number of white teachers after the great recession. Despite adding a small number of Black and Latino/a teachers; the 35 capitol region districts’ percentage of Black and Latino/a teachers remained level from 2004-12. (See the chart below)

Source: CT State Department of Education, 2015

As the enrollment of students in public school choice programs has increased, so has the number of teachers working in interdistrict magnet and charter schools. (See chart below) This rapid growth is one clear result of State policy increasing funds and policy supports for public school choice programs that are operated by separate, non-traditional school districts such as CREC and charter districts. In the case of magnet schools, the growth has come as a result of implementing the Sheff v. O’Neill desegregation settlement.

Source: CT State Department of Education, 2015

The Capitol Region Education Council (CREC), a regional district that operates interdistrict magnet schools, and the Hartford-area charter school districts added to their numbers of teachers in all race/ethnicity categories from 2004-12. In fact, the CREC magnet school district and Jumoke, Odyssey, and Achievement First – Hartford charter school districts more than doubled their (general education) teacher force from 2004-12. In addition to white teachers, the racially segregated Jumoke Academy and Achievement First-Hartford added several Black and Latino/a teachers over the last decade, thus increasing their combined proportion of these groups of teachers. (See the interactive data visualization below. Place your cursor over any bar segment to see the number of teachers in each category.)

Source: CT State Department of Education, 2015

Over the last decade, Hartford started (and ended) programs and neoliberal policies such as school closures, staff reconstitution, principal “autonomy”, privatization, hyper-accountability, reduced economic security for teachers, preferential hiring for inexperienced and mostly white Teach for America participants, intradistrict and interdistrict school choice. Any number of these initiatives could have impacted have impacted the hiring and retention of teachers of color during these years.

Final Thoughts

At this point, and with the limited data available, it’s hard to untangle which single policy or event made the most impact. Did Black and Latino teachers in the Hartford Public Schools quit, retire, leave to other schools, or get forced out? If so, why? The short answer is that we don’t know.

The idea that some Black and Latino/a teachers left HPS (for currently unknown reasons) and took up work in other school districts in the region as HPS faced layoffs and other districts, magnets, and charters added staff is one possible explanation of where they went. The numbers invite this explanation as a possibility, but the data does not entirely confirm or explain what’s going on. We don’t have enough information yet to make a conclusion.

Combining the losses and additions of Black and Latino/a teachers for all public school districts (capital region, CREC, Hartford, charter schools), there is still a net loss of 27 Latino/a teachers and 39 Black teachers from 2004-12 within the capitol region. In other words, the Hartford Public Schools lost more Black and Latino/a teachers than were added in other local districts, including the magnet (CREC) and charter schools during this period.

Where did the Black and Latino/a teachers in Hartford go?  Hmmmm…

Last week I attended the Metro Hartford Progress Points Forum on Access to Better Schools, hosted by the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving, and held at my home campus of Trinity College. One of the panelists was my colleague Robert Cotto, the Director of Urban Educational Initiatives, who also teaches courses in our Educational Studies Program and collaborates with me on the Cities Suburbs and Schools Project. In this wide-ranging discussion of public school choice and declining enrollments across the Hartford region, Robert made several comments that helped to re-center the conversation and re-focus the audience’s attention on what matters most. (The Foundation’s YouTube video allows me to point readers to specific segments that stood out in my mind.)

During the first segment (minutes 19:15-23:45), Robert told a story that I had not previously heard, about how he initially became involved in school choice research. After teaching at a magnet school and being elected to the Hartford board of education, he became more immersed in education data. Members of a local organization, Connecticut Parent Power, asked him an important question: Do magnet schools and charter schools do better academically than traditional schools? Robert explained that while he could not directly answer that question, due to data limitations, he could help them to “peel back some of the layers” of choice schools by answering a related question. Using publicly available data, Robert showed that in Connecticut, on average, magnet/charter/technical schools enroll more advantaged student populations than traditional public schools, based on measures such as family income, language, and disability status. His presentation to a parent organization eventually led to his Choice Watch report, published by Connecticut Voices for Children in 2014.

Click the video above to jump to minute 19:15

During a second segment (39:15-45:00) on innovative strategies to break down barriers to educational opportunity, Robert reminded the audience that Connecticut’s interdistrict magnet schools “have solved a number of problems, but created others.” Twenty-five years ago, most families in the Hartford region attended racially segregated schools, based on rigid attendance boundary lines that followed segregated housing patterns. But activists behind the 1989 Sheff school integration case altered our educational landscape, by pressuring the State to create over 40 magnet schools in the region, which use special curricular themes to attract both city and suburban families. Magnet schools “break down the lines of towns,” Robert emphasized, and are so popular that most of Hartford’s political leaders seek to enroll their own children. But magnets have created a second generation of problems that we need to address. Although Connecticut’s public school choice programs (including both magnets and charter schools) are enrolling larger numbers of children, “we are not being very deliberative about [which] students are [attending], and how fair that process is,” nor are we consciously thinking about the implications of shrinking school enrollments across the metropolitan region.

Click the video above to jump to minute 39:15

Near the end of the forum (1:12:00 — 1:14:00), Robert responded to an audience question about school choice opportunities for Hartford students in suburban towns with declining enrollments. Recently, school boards in predominantly White suburbs, such as Glastonbury, have voted to close some of their under-enrolled elementary schools, rather than invite more Hartford children to attend through the state-subsidized Open Choice transfer program. Robert argues that these debates demonstrate White resistance to school integration, and he called for re-centering the discussion at this forum. “If Glastonbury’s enrollment is declining, and they don’t want to open the school, and it’s because they don’t want Black and Brown kids, then fine, close it,” he stated. Robert described how his three-year-old niece, a Hartford resident, “spends two hours on the bus to go to a CREC magnet school” located in a distant suburb. If suburbs resist integration, then the solution is to build more racially and economically diverse school programs here in the higher-density city, rather than the sprawling suburbs. “For me,” he concluded, “school choice programs are helpful to the extent that they are helping kids in Hartford.”

Click the video above to jump to hour/minute 1:12:00