District 65 Acknowldeges Need for Technology...

By Mary Helt Gavin

Students in Erin Murphy's class use an interactive whiteboard to share their ideas with their classmates. Photo by Chris Cascarano

Erin Murphy's social studies classes at Nichols Middle School come up to the whiteboard displaying a picture of the Trail of Tears.

Using special markers, they draw circles around the Native American figures riding and walking through the gloomy woods shrouded in blankets and the cluster of blackbirds in the snow that indicate sadness or doom.

This interactive whiteboard, called a Promethean Board, overlays the static blackboard it replaces and serves as an example of how technology is moving into the curriculum of District 65 schools.

"On a daily basis I hear students excited to ask, ‘Will you help me?'” Ms. Murphy said at the March 19 District 65 School Board meeting, as Board members pondered how they could fund the technology needs of their 16 schools. She continued, "The students are eager. Variety is key in a classroom, to keep kids from getting bored - and technology will help.”

District 65 administrators propose upgrading its technology - at both the administrative and classroom levels - by replacing outdated computers; purchasing new Promethean Boards, digital document cameras and other equipment; and broadening its bandwidth for quicker downloads and implementing wireless connections where possible.

The District's wish list of technology upgrades is projected to cost $2.8 million in fiscal year 2007 and about $7.5 over seven years. Board members have spent several weeks wrestling with the amount of money they were willing to allocate to technology over the next few years and how they would pay for it.

In the end, after much heated discussion on March 19 and 26, the vote was 5-2 to spend $3 million in bonds to replace and upgrade outdated equipment.

Although there will be new technology for students and teachers in the fall, this appears to be a stopgap measure, as the Board did not address funding for technology in future. A new Board will take over after the April 17 election.

...But Wrangle Over How to Finance Technology Spending

Although most school districts in the area fund their technology through a combination of operating revenues and bond issues, District 65 administrators have said for at least two years that the District can afford only bond funding.

Although the District's projections, prepared by consultants PMA, show the District to be in good shape for the next several years, those projections omitted the cost of technology funding. The District's Long-Term Financial Management Plan, adopted in 2005, suggested that the District would have to seek alternate [other than operating revenues] funding sources for technology upgrades.

In Illinois, funds for a school district's operating expenses are limited by tax caps. Although there are limits to the amount of bonds a school district can issue without a referendum, for the most part using bond funds allows a district to evade tax caps,

State law allows school districts to consider as "capital expenses” things with a life expectancy of more than one year, said Dr. Mary Brown, the District's chief financial officer.

In addition to evading tax caps, funding technology through bond issues keeps technology a separate entity apart from the programs that have to compete for the operating revenues, said Board President Mary Erickson.

That is, if the District can use bonds to fund technology, it may use its operating revenues for other programs such as special education and potential funding for programs for gifted students, said District Superintendent Dr. Hardy Murphy.

In the last few weeks technology funding came to the Board for discussion, when the administration proposed using bond proceeds to replace and upgrade its hardware and software. In early March, the administration proposed issuing $10 million in bonds to be used for life safety projects as well as technology purposes.

The District allocates about $600,000 annually for technology funding, said Ms. Erickson - which is not enough even to keep up with a replacement schedule, let alone provide needed upgrades.

While all Board members appeared to understand the need to fund additional technology, some found the use of bond funds problematic.

Among their objections were that technology should be funded only through operating revenues or jointly through operating and capital expenditure, that the technology products may be obsolete before the bonds issued to fund them are paid off, and that the administration had not produced a long-term plan to show how the money would be spent.

Board member Jonathan Baum said that, although he supported technology, he thought it was "sound fiscal policy” to have a plan that weaned the District to a funding package that combined capital and operating revenues.

Dr. Brown, Dr. Murphy and Paul Brinson, director of information services, presented several scenarios that showed how the Board could fund technology through successive bond issues.

Capital funds for technology

Dr. Murphy and Dr. Brown advocated additional bond issues, taking advantage of the debt service extension base (DSEB), implemented in 1994 along with tax caps. The DSEB is the amount of debt a school district is allowed to repay annually and is based on a formula using the amount of debt the District had in 1994, said Dr. Brown.

While Board members did not accept their invitation to commit to a long-term series of bonds, at the March 26 meeting there was much discussion about whether and how the District would be able to increase the use of operating revenues to fund technology.

The Board voted 5-2 to use $3 million from bond proceeds to fund technology from either existing bond proceeds or by issuing new debt.

Sharon Sheehan and Jonathan Baum voted against the proposal, Ms. Sheehan because she said the District had not presented a satisfactory or complete plan for spending the funds, and Mr. Baum because, he said, funding technology from bonds without a plan to wean the District to at least a combination of operating and bond revenues was not sound fiscal policy.

Nichols Receives Computer Donation

An anonymous donor has made a contribution of nearly $300,000 to Nichols Middle School to purchase new computers and software. In accepting the gift, the District 65 School Board agreed that the donation would not supplant any computer upgrades contemplated for the school and that Nichols would be treated equitably in all District programs.

District 202 Budget Projections Still Red; Policies and ‘Fiscal Prudence' Proposed

By Jennie Berkson

Although current budget projections for District 202 are written mostly in red ink, administrators predict that new financial policies presented to the School Board on March 26 will aid with "proactive measures to avoid future deficits.”

Updated five-year projections for the District provided by PMA Financial Network show only 2008 as having a surplus; all other years are projected to have deficits ranging anywhere from a low of minus $514,750 in 2011 to a high of minus $2,414,830 in 2012.

"This is clearly a financial outcome that the District should not allow to occur,” said William Stafford, chief financial officer.

Revenues for the District are projected to be $62.3 million in 2008, rising to $70.6 million in 2012; expenses are projected to be $62.0 million in 2008, rising to $73.0 million in 2012. This means that the highest deficit, in 2012, would be 3.4 percent of revenues.

Board member Mary Wilkerson expressed concern that the community would perceive these predictions in a negative light. "Some people are saying that the sky is falling already. It's a planning process . . . these are models and projections,” she said. "What we have from PMA is put together based on some assumptions.”

Mr. Stafford agreed, citing possible increases in new City property taxes that have been estimated "conservatively” in the projections. "There are indications that development is going relatively strongly,” he said, so the District could receive more revenues than currently projected.

"We are not in deficit financing in any way,” said Superintendent Eric Witherspoon. "What this tells us is that we will have to be very fiscally prudent when we make decisions, because this is what we could face without interventions.”

Board Vice-President Jane Colleton asked if that meant there would be more cuts.

"We're going to have to look at reductions for the next several years to make this work,” said Mr. Stafford. He said they would look at a number of areas, but specified only "a significant number of retirements over the next few years” as a place for potential reductions.

Laying the groundwork for future budget planning, Mr. Stafford cited the Government Finance Officers Association recommendations that financial policies in the area of budget, revenues and expenditures be "developed by professional staff and formally adopted by the jurisdiction's governing board.” According to Mr. Stafford, many of the recommended guidelines might have been followed in practice in the past, but they have not been drafted and accepted as formal policies.

A variety of policies were proposed for budget, revenues and expenditures. In the budget area, for example, the Education Fund will be required to be "balanced annually with current revenues offsetting current expenditures.” In addition, for the IMRF and Social Security Fund, "sufficient revenues [will be required] to meet the annual actuarially determined funding requirements by the IMRF fund and federal government.”

Revenue policies cover such areas as diversification, fees and charges and use of one-time or non-recurring revenues. The policies encourage reduction of dependency on property taxes (currently more than 80 percent of revenue) and basing fees and charges on all the direct and indirect costs of providing the service, something that Mr. Stafford said is not currently the practice at ETHS.

According to the new proposals, non-recurring revenues will only be applied toward non-recurring expenditures. In addition, fund reserves carried from the prior year will be spent only for non-recurring projects. "You can't spend non-recurring revenue on recurring expenses,” said Mr. Stafford, "because you won't have that money to count on again in the future.”

Board member Missy Fleming asked if it might be worthwhile for the school to increase its revenue through grants, applications for which would require some staff time. "I think that is money well-spent,” said Mr. Stafford. He related his experience at the City of Evanston where a grant-writer was hired, "and made quadruple back the first year.”

Starting in 2011, the District will receive an additional $2 million, a result of the expiration of the Downtown II TIF. Mr. Stafford said the difference between the 2011deficit of minus $514,750 and the 2010 deficit of minus $1,133,598 is the revenue from the TIF. "But in FY 2012 it goes right back up to $2.4 million. And what that means is that the downtown TIF is not a panacea. It will assist us, but it is not the magic pill,” he said.

In the expenditure area, the Education, Operations and Maintenance, Transportation and Working Cash funds will be required to have a minimum of 33 percent or four months of expenditures maintained as a cash reserve.

A reserve range of 33-45 percent of expenditures will be maintained. If the reserve balance falls below the minimum, a plan will be developed to return to the minimum balance in a reasonable period of time. Any balance above the maximum will be transferred to the Operations and Maintenance Fund for construction, renovation, and major maintenance repairs to District facilities.

Mr. Stafford said these guidelines are in line with those of other area school districts: New Trier has a minimum of 4.5 months' reserve; Glenbrook and Arlington Heights maintain a 33-percent and a 30- to 35-percent range, respectively. He said Illinois school districts with AA1 and AA ratings, like Evanston, maintain these levels. Previously, ETHS had a practice of a 25-percent reserve, but it was not policy.

Another new policy in the expenditure area will be "position control and vacancy analysis.” As positions become vacant, a joint analysis by the Business Office and Human Resource Department will assess the continuing need for that position.

"We are going to have in the next two or three years a significant amount of people who work for this institution who are going to retire, and we need to evaluate those positions in terms of the programs we are running,” said Mr. Stafford. "We're trying to look at this in a forward-looking manner.”

ETHS Kudos

ETHS senior Alex Driscoll recently won second place in the Student Television Network's anchoring contest held on site at the STN convention in Anaheim, CA. Alex is the Executive Producer of ETHS's KIT-TV News. He beat out more than 60 of the country's best high school TV anchors. Each entrant received a copy of a wire story to be rewritten into broadcast style and read live-to-tape. The final script must be between :45 and :55 seconds. The entrants had 45 minutes to write their script before arriving for their taping session. Judges were looking for a performance that was conversational and credible, with important information presented in an interesting and appropriate manner. Contestants had to speak clearly, watch their posture, and avoid wearing clothing that was distracting or inappropriate.

Junior Jacqueline Newsome finished in the top five in state competition for the Poetry Out Loud Contest in February. She qualified for state finals by winning the Chicago regional competition by reciting Maya Angelou's "Still I Rise.” At state finals, she recited two long, difficult poems -"A Psalm of Life” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and "Ballad of Birmingham” by Dudley Randall. Twenty-three ETHS students entered the local contest and were coached by teacher Molly Moynahan.

Five ETHS teams (38 students) competed in the Junior Engineering and Technical Society (JETS) competition at Triton College on Feb. 28. Two varsity teams took first and second place, and one ETHS JV teams took second place (just one point behind Stevenson High School). The varsity team that finished in first place consisted of seniors Walter Blaurock, Joshua Carley, Elliot Damashek, Reuben Doetsch, Nick Rolfes, Nick Salter, Ari Strandburg-Peshkin, and Anna Waymack. The varsity team that finished in second place was made up of seniors Jacob Belser, Nell Elliott, Katie Fisher, Will Grodzicki, Miriam Marks, Sammy Marks, Ben Simon, and Jack Wadden. The JV team that finished in second place consisted of juniors Brian Armstrong, Barry Frett, Jacob Parzen, Nadia Pierrehumbert, Tatyana Saleski, Andy Scheff and Andy Schneider.

FAAM Celebrates 39 Years of Youth Basketball

By Nick Batlle

On March 24, the Fellowship of Afro-American Men (FAAM) held their annual awards banquet to honor the hard work involved in putting together yet another successful basketball season.

But success isn't measured in wins and losses. According to FAAM president Dudley Brown, the league teaches something far more valuable.

"Our goal is to draw positive role models for the youth in the community,” Brown explained. "We stress citizenship and academics.”

After 39 years of molding middle schoolers into competitive athletes and responsible members of society, the program has grown to include more than 400 players and 70 volunteers, many of whom are coaches.

This year the winner of the boys' tournament was the Jazz, while the Pacers took the crown on the girls' side. FAAM also gives out academic awards.

The essay contest winners were Alanna Williams, a sixth-grader, Sachi Ishida from the seventh grade, and eighth-grader Abby Blabolil.

FAAM has become what Mr. Brown calls the "dominant playing and teaching league on the North Shore,” and he warns that the 40th year will be bigger than ever.

Veterans to Receive ETHS Diplomas

Evanston Township High School District 202 is looking for veterans of World War II and the Korean War who left high school before graduation to serve their country.

ETHS wants to honor these eligible veterans, or their family members, with their diplomas on Sunday, June 3, when ETHS holds its graduation ceremony for the Class of 2007. ETHS veteran diploma applications may be requested by contacting Bruce Romain, associate principal, ETHS, 1600 Dodge Ave., Evanston, IL 60204, or by calling his office at 847-424-7700. Interested people are urged to apply as soon as possible.

Veterans who attended high school in other Illinois communities should contact the school district where they attended school.

Nominations Sought for Outstanding Volunteer Award

The Evanston/Skokie Council of PTAs is calling for nominations for its 2007 Phyllis Ganser Outstanding PTA Volunteer of the Year Award. Nominees should meet the following criteria:

- A commitment to the PTA goal of promoting the welfare of all school children

- A willingness to work in any capacity (even behind the scenes)

- A spirit and enthusiasm for volunteer work

- A demonstrated ability to engage and involve other volunteers.

The only eligibility requirement is that the nominee be a member in good standing of the PTA/PTSA. For further information and nomination forms, please contact Laura Antolin, 1426 Dempster St., Evanston, Illinois 60202; 847- 328-5786; lantolin@sbcglobal.net or http://home.earthlink.net/~mwyler

Nomination forms are due April 10. The winner of this honorary award will be announced a May School Board meeting, and the name will be placed on a plaque in the District 65 Administration Building.

Scholarship for Academically Talented 7th-Graders

The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation is offering students the opportunity to apply for their Young Scholars Program.The Foundation provides exceptional students with individualized educational guidance and educational services, which could include tutors, summer programs, on-line classes, computers, and tuition throughout high school.

The Young Scholars Program is highly competitive and attracts outstanding applicants from across the United States.

The specific criteria for consideration are:
Current 7th grade students Strong academic record, awards/honors, teacher recommendation Financial need Motivation, Leadership An appreciation for the arts, music, literature, or similar fields.
Application materials are available NOW on the Foundation's website at www.jackkentcookefoundation.org along with more information about the Foundation itself. Candidates must submit their completed application to the address on the application, with all materials specified in the program guidelines, by the receipt deadline of May 7, 2007.

If you or someone from your organization needs more information or have questions about the Jack Kent Cooke Young Scholars Program, please don't hesitate to contact me at 1-847-491-7127. We would like as many qualified individuals to take part in this rare opportunity as possible.

Ellen Fogelberg Honored As Outstanding Reading Educator

Ellen Fogelberg, District 65's literacy director, is the 2007 Illinois Outstanding Reading Educator. She was recognized for her work in the District and for her contributions to literacy development in the state at the Illinois Reading Conference in Springfield.

"I and others in District 65 have long recognized the talents and contributions of Ellen Fogelberg,” said Superintendent Hardy Murphy. "Her statewide recognition is well-deserved. Ms. Fogelberg brings a depth of knowledge, energy, awareness and passion to the District's reading curriculum.”

"People are always impressed and amazed at our teachers and our administrators,” Ms. Folgelberg said at the March 19 School Board meeting, where she was lauded again. She said she appreciated the fact that many teachers had spent their release time in professional development on literacy.

ETHS Math Team Takes Second

The Evanston Math Team took second place at the ICTM Regional Contest held in North Park College on Feb. 24.

Individual awards went to Elliot Damachek (1st place tie, Pre-Calculus team) and Vladislav Kontsevoi (2nd place, Algebra I team). Overall, the team scored 759 points, which qualifies Evanston for the state finalsin April.

The team members at regional were seniors Matthew Byrd, Elliot Damashek, Nell Elliot, Will Grodzicki, Lianna Hershey-Nexon, Daniel Kipp, Miriam Marks, Jaime Rojas, Nick Salter and Ben Simon; juniors Megan Buonaiuto, Matthey Glickson, Kendall Granberry, Claire Meurice, Lilly Nassiri, Jacob Parzen, Tatiana Saleski, and Andy Scheff ; sophomores Linnea Blaurock, Hannah Burson, Megan Cutrofello, Maeve Dixon, Gabe Jacobs, Mo'am Keesom, Matthew Omori, Jeffrey Prescott and Melanie Rivera; freshmen Aaron Damashek, Maggie Hanson, Colleen Harper, Vladik Kontsevoi, Keenan Langston, Sarah Peters, Meaghan Ross, Ben Sheu, Vidur Sood and Sarah Uttal.