Lewiston Regional Technical Center 2013-2014 Budget As Developed by Rob Schmidt EDU 709 School Finance October 28, 2012

Population Lewiston Regional Technical Center (LRTC) serves students from Lewiston, Leavitt, Poland, Oak Hill, Lisbon, and Edward Little. Each “sending school” has a certain amount of seats available based on a contract. The contract is essentially the same each year so the population of LRTC remains very consistent. Approximately 620 “program students”.

This is where my budget separates itself from the current budget. Changes to Curriculum This is where my budget separates itself from the current budget. Major Changes

One Program Eliminated Engineering and Design Technology has had low student enrollment for several years and will therefore be eliminated. I have left the category line, salary, benefits, and classroom supplies for this class in my budget to demonstrate the change. This can be found on line 82.

Staff Eliminated Unfortunately with the elimination of a program I would have to eliminate one Full Time Equivalent (FTE) teacher. This would be very difficult for me to do, but it is for the good of more students because…

Cooperative Education and Customer Service will be added to LRTC. One Program Added Cooperative Education and Customer Service will be added to LRTC. These programs will replace the Engineering and Design Technology program. One instructor will teach both. Salary will be based on years of teaching and professional experience but is estimated at $48,000 plus benefits. This change can be found on line 132 of my budget.

Why Cooperative Education? Over the years Co-Op has been the one class that “at-risk” students look forward to taking as juniors and seniors. These students want or need to work to make money. Co-Op allows them earn credits while they are making $. Some students sign-up for Co-Op so they can leave school early…so what! If that is the incentive for them to come to school…good!

Why Customer Service? Not every person is bound for college. The harsh reality is that some people will be in entry level jobs for a long time. In order to be successful in those jobs it is essential that they learn how to deal with not only their co-workers and boss, but also with the public. Without strong customer service skills they will not be successful in these jobs.

One Position Added Replacing the lost FTE engineering instructor would be one FTE Cooperative Education/Consumer Economics instructor. -1 + 1 = $0 change (this does of course depend upon years of teaching and industry experience as well as benefits).

Consumer Economics The current marketing instructor will drop two teaching sections: one section of Marketing I and one section of Marketing II. These two sections will be replaced by two sections of Consumer Economics. Cost difference = $0

Why Consumer Economics? According to Bankruptcyaction.com the number of people in the United States who filed for bankruptcy in 2010 was 1,536,799. With statistics like this how can schools not be teaching Consumer Economics? This class would start with two sections at LRTC for the 2013-2014 school year as an elective. Eventually it would be a graduation requirement.

Revenue Changes The tax base in Lewiston is relatively stable. There are more ELL citizens moving in to the city rather than people moving out. Lewiston is therefore in what is arguably a good financial situation because it receives a very high dollar amount of subsidy from the State of Maine.

Revenue Changes The local tax revenue has not changed in the past two years and I am not anticipating a change in my budget. The amount of state subsidy has gone up over $1.5 million in the past two years, therefore I conservatively anticipate it will go up another $500,000 for the 2012-2013 budget.

Facility/Maintenance The lease of the culinary program building @ $122,000/year for 10 years continues to be the largest facility expense.

Facility/Maintenance I do not anticipate any major facility expenses for the next school year, however I do have an emergency fund built into my budget of $10,000 per year. This is shown on line 175 of my budget.

Notes: I have allocated $6,000 for books. This is based on 3 programs receiving new books each year. If I were in charge of the school I would like to eventually go “book free”.

Notes: It is difficult to develop a budget without talking to individual teachers about their needs. The revenue line for LRTC is lumped in with all of the other revenues for the entire Lewiston school district. It is therefore difficult to understand or anticipate next year’s revenue. There is a lot of “grey area”.