LADY BUDGETDOWN'S SOCIETY PAPERS
Rochester Community Schools: A Decade in the Ledger
Dearest Readers,
It seems Lady Budgetdown's first examination of Rochester's books caused a bit of a stir.
Some insisted: "But what about inflation?"
A perfectly reasonable question. So, naturally, Lady Budgetdown adjusted the ledger.
Using approximately 32.4% inflation from 2014-15 to 2024-25, the numbers become rather interesting:
💰 Total Funding: +43.5% — 11.1 points above inflation
📚 Total Instruction: +32.0% — 0.4 points below inflation
✏️ Instructional Support: +81.1% — 48.7 points above inflation
💼 Business & Administration: +50.5% — 18.1 points above inflation
🔧 Operations & Maintenance: +83.3% — 50.9 points above inflation
👩�🏫 Average Teacher Salary: +22.2% — 10.2 points below inflation
Meanwhile...
👥 Enrollment declined 1.5%, from roughly 14,996 students to 14,776.
So even after accounting for inflation, the question remains:
Why did Instruction and teacher salaries fail to keep pace with inflation while Instructional Support, Business & Administration, and Operations & Maintenance increased substantially faster than inflation?
Inflation does not make the original question disappear, Dear Readers.
It merely makes the spending priorities easier to see.
After all, Lady Budgetdown does not choose what the ledger says.
She merely reads it. 🪶📜
Source: Michigan Department of Education Bulletin 1014; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI.
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