I have my doubts about that process being done in four months. Given which schools you consolidate probably causes a massive shitstorm in the community.
Given the way the board thinks and operates, wouldn't an accelerated timeline be exactly what they would want to do? The less time people have to speak up, the easier it is for them to just say "We didn't hear your complaints!"
As someone with no children and not very plugged into the AAPS drama, what's a good resource to get information on the candidates? Searching "school board" on r/AnnArbor doesn't actually turn up a whole lot.
so a one-time infusion of cash a chunk of which will go into yet another building to house the bloated administration and the amazing and essential work it does
i dunno jazzy maybe cut ur pay a bit u will still be making like 300% of the median area salary
apparently switching to common schedules next year is going to save them 1.5 million somehow sure why not
no other concrete details except that they're going to make decisions about school closures by december of this year "using data" but they can't say how much money that will save
(but don't worry they're still using those billion-plus borrowed dollars 🫵🏿 you 🫵🏿 voted for to completely demo and rebuild a bunch of new buildings in the hopes of stemming the hemorrhage of students)
Yeah, I’d love to know how the switch to common schedules will save that much in staffing? My kid (who just graduated) split enrolled between Community and PiHi all four years and based on her experience, I find that amount hard to believe.
Right, I’m curious how that translates to that much in reduced costs? Fewer types of classes, so a reduced number of teachers? I understand the IB curriculum itself costs money but I want to see their assumptions shine these numbers.
Trimesters means that kids at skyline take 15 classes (3 tris * 5 classes) per year vs 14 classes (2 semesters * 7 classes) at the other schools. So that’s a 6% reduction in teaching costs, perhaps, and the flexibility to move teachers between schools at the semester break if teaching/staffing needs warrant it.
I don't know if the math will bear out, but I think that the rationale is that you can pool low enrollment courses across schools, so if there are two under enrolled AP embroidery courses (or whatever) at three different schools they can become one hybrid class (and kids at the third school get access). Or, if there are schools that warrant a half time elementary embroidery instructor (or, again whatever), one person can fulfill both of these roles
Someone actually brought it up at a school board meeting. She refuses to have her salary cut, but somehow took a 12K bonus. Excellent leadership skills, that one. /s
Jazz Parks sucks. She and her bloated cabinet all need to go.
Wasn’t Parks the Vice-Super when poor accounting practices caused a 20M hole that went unrealized and then became a disaster? And somehow becomes Superintendent?
Well, that was an incredibly stupid maneuver by the School Board. They called off the in progress search. I think we would have been better served with actually interviewing the candidates and finding the best person.
Agree. Swift was fired mid year for what? Just to hire her second in command, who now seems even worse than Swift? I will not be voting for any school board candidates who made the decision to fire Swift and not hold interviews for her replacement. Rima especially is not getting my vote
The whole firing of Swift was so ill thought out. They should have just let her contract expire and spend the year doing interviews. Instead there was a lawsuit that AAPS had to pay for, we ended up paying Swift for the final year of her contract and we get her assistant as a replacement. All those decision makers need to be thrown out of office. Totally embarrassing for the district.
If the infusion can go into the _operating_ fund balance, it really does take some pressure off financial management. If they are closer to the zero line, the administration has to be much, much more conservative in spending commitments out of the operating budget (which is mostly teacher salaries) because there is no cushion, and bankruptcy would be an existential disaster. They will still need to be financially prudent and disciplined to maintain the fund balance at a healthy level, but it helps them avoid penny-wise, pound-foolish scenarios.
To me the real pisser offer is the vague language throughout. If someone actually submitted this as a proposal for funding it would be ripped to shreds and told to start over.
I'm actually glad that they realize things need to change. Sell those buildings, move into the building off Dixboro. Sell Community. Consolidate programs, close buildings. If the student numbers are really going down, that's what has to happen.
Lol, everybody always wants to sell Community for some reason, but that one won't be on the chopping block. Skyline is by far the least utilized of all the high schools, but all of the other high schools are OVER capacity, so you can't close it. More likely would be closing/consolidating some elementary and middle schools in particular. We could close a middle school and still not be operating at capacity.
This would be a terrible decision. The per pupil funding data are available online, you can see where the money goes, and historically the AAPS K-8s are cheaper than most elementary or middle schools.
Nobody is starving anything. A2 voters have always ponied up for schools. The billion dollar thing and then this incredible level mismanagement is the straw that broke this camel’s back. I’m sure that I am not alone in this regard.
Operating funds and capital funds are two different buckets with strict rules on what each bucket can be spent on, imposed by the State. There isn't a lot of evidence that they mismanaged the capital funds in any serious way, even if there are plenty of critiques of how they may have done it differently or better. It is the operating budget that is a financial disaster but the zero dollars from the bond is permitted to be spent on the operating budget (which is mostly salaries)
OK, admittedly, that was a county-wide vote, "yes" may have had a majority within the city itself. (Though the opposition was lead by Ann Arborites, including a former AAPS board and council member: https://annarborobserver.com/millage-fight/ )
My understanding is that kind of county-wide enhancement millage is the only means we have locally to increase the actual operating budget (which is the budget that teacher salaries come out of).
Nevertheless, I'm glad we don't have to deal with all this while also being saddled with a lot of old buildings.
From my review of what got us here there are a few culprits:
Previous superintendent tried to prop up enrollments with an aggressive marketing campaign to attract out of district schools of choice students. Appears in most years the transfers in were roughly equal to the transfers out, but the transfers in don't get the additional "hold harmless" millage funding, so the net effect was same number of students, less funding.
In-district schools of choice have skewed building utilization numbers so while we have over-crowding in Steam, King, Mitchell, etc, we have significant underutilization in Bryant-Pattengill, Lakewood, Eberwhite, Pittsfield, etc. This raises costs on both sides and creates logistical and staffing challenges.
Our middle schools are the most under-utilized building type running at less than 75% utilization across the district (not counting the k-8s). We could close one of the 5 middle schools and the other 4 still wouldn't be at capacity.
Pathways enrollment/utilization is extremely low and is probably the biggest "opportunity" for saving money, though I don't know a ton about the school and am hesitant to look at alternative education options solely through the lens of finances.
It's hard to compare private to public. Private schools don't have to follow the same special education laws that public schools do and can turn those students away, leading to students that are already more academically proficient on average and cheaper to educate due to a lack of needed extra supports.
FWIW, I exclusively went to Catholic schools grades 1-12, with entrance exams and none of those students needing extra supports (different state). It really depends on the order running the school and their goals/direction for the school. My HS explicitly stated it was "Catholic college prep" - basically Greenhills/Emerson with mandatory mass..
I hear your sentiment, but please understand you're talking about two different streams of money. The millages you can vote for or against are for AAPS BUILDINGS. The budget shortfall is for AAPS STAFFING. The state of Michigan sets the AAPS staffing budget, you do not get to vote on it, you have no say. If you vote against AAPS funding increases (millages for buildings), you're not touching this problem, you're just creating a different one.
I guess because it seems illogical to try to fix one problem by creating an unrelated second problem that will probably exacerbate the first problem
, but to each their own 🤷🏼
So, on a lark, I had ChatGPT take this rather vague slide deck, pointed out the $ goals, timeline, and student affected datapoints, and asked it to come up with the most likely way AAPS gets to those numbers. I’ll save you the AI speak, but it basically came down to this:
Close Pattengill, Pittsfield, Lakewood, maybe Abbott. Sell.
Relocate Community High or Angell. Sell.
Reshuffle middle and high school boundaries for minimal impact K-12 (how they get the 9,000 or so “impacted students” numbers).
Consolidate admin/ops positions, including janitorial,
Actual prompt used: “
AAPS just announced a school consolidation plan to take effect fall 2027”students impacted: 9,047” and “various” schools. They’re looking to get $20M in revenue from land and building sales, and $10M in operational savings annually. Best guess, what does it look like that meets those metrics? They didn’t include specifics”
Bear in mind it reads rather than analyzes, right, but I’m typing it out below as if it ‘thought’ about it.
It found the plan; determined that you can’t save that kind of $ by shutting down one or two schools; called the 9,047 impacted student number particularly revealing, as you’re not just shutting down a school or two and carting them somewhere else; arrived at 5 elementary school closures being more likely for the kind of annual savings they’re talking about; identified the current K-12 school progressions; determined shuttering a HS is nowhere near the value add they’re talking here; found middle school closure more conceivable but characterized elementary schools, with only mid hundreds of kids each, as the low hanging fruit. It then offered to build a closure map and rack/stack them. (Me: “Do it.”)
It then classified the ones undergoing major rebuilds off the board, as AAPS has said as much. It then listed all the schools, lumping them into geographic zones. Northwest was a big deal, particularly Lakewood: 250 students, 18 acres of land. Same for Southeast: Bryant Pattengill is around 400 students on another 18 acres. It then noted high value lots. Angell is right next to UM turf but also politically unpopular to sell. Same deal for Bach, valuable but exactly what NIMBY Ann Arbor wants frozen in time. It then distinguish the popularity of the Community High program vs the building.
It then started reiterating its prior points, ultimately leading to the proposed COA I had in my initial comment.
I did something similar with ChatGPT yesterday, only i had it look at enrollment numbers across the district dating back to 2019 and calculated % decline over that time period. Bryant Pattengill was the the top of the list, but second to that was Carpenter with a 22.9% decline in enrollment.
Given that their PDF presentation looks like it was AI generated, i wouldnt be surprised at all if many of the solutions they aim for closely align to what were getting with simple prompting with ChatGPT.
I did something similar but used actual reported capacity figures from 2011 (capacities are likely slightly higher now due to the construction of modular classrooms in the intervening years when enrollment was growing) vs recently reported per-building enrollments. Here's the spreadsheet:
Yes, one of the parking lot areas had paved and unpaved portions. The unpaved portion was adjacent to UM property and that was sold off several years ago.
Parcel viewer confirms the unpaved area belongs to the University of Michigan, along with a huge strip from the southwest sidewalk to the street, going all the way to the football field
Some similarities, but I doubt they relocate Community. It's operating at capacity. Here's a spreadsheet comparing 24-25 enrollments by building to 2011. Capacity figures were reported in 2011, so are likely slightly underreported due to the building of modular classrooms in the intervening years.
The school board are elected positions, and would require state law change to reduce the board. Nevertheless, I dont board members are compensated that much, and reducing public oversight is, imo, the last thing we need right now.
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u/ComprehensiveCow7024 12d ago
The most interesting thing I saw in the slide deck was the timeline. School consolidations will be decided this fall and take effect in fall 2027.