Dearest readers, Lady Budgetdown has turned the page on Ashley Community Schools, and Step 2 has given the ledger another curious little tale.
Ashley is a very small district, so we shall keep that firmly in mind. In a district this size, a handful of positions can make percentages move dramatically.
But the direction of the numbers is still worth noticing.
Over ten years:
Pupil count fell from 268 to 192.75, down 28.1%.
Meanwhile, total staffing FTE went from 34.81 to 42.12, up 21.0%.
And tucked inside that total:
🪶 Administrator FTE: up 14.3%
🪶 Teacher FTE: up 43.5%
🪶 Non-instructional/support FTE: up 48.2%
🪶 Paraprofessional/aide FTE: down 69.2%
So while Ashley was serving roughly 75 fewer pupils, it was reporting about 7.3 more total staffing FTE.
Does that automatically mean something improper happened? Of course not.
Staffing needs change. Programs change. Student needs change. And in a district with fewer than 200 pupils, even a few positions matter enormously.
But Lady Budgetdown's job isn't to make the numbers behave themselves. It is to put them on the table exactly as they appear in the ledger.
And these are certainly numbers worth putting on the table.
Next comes Step 2A, where we'll look at the staffing picture through a second dataset and see what else the receipts have to say.
With receipts and respect. 🪶
#LadyBudgetdown #AshleyCommunitySchools #GratiotCounty #MichiganSchools #SchoolFinance #PublicEducation #FollowTheReceipts