Unity school aims for flat budget

By GLYNIS HART
[email protected]
UNITY – The Unity school district budget committee waded into the draft budget for next year with high hopes to keep taxes level, and a few missing numbers. The committee met Tuesday night for the first in many months of meetings to prepare a vote-ready budget by March. 

The draft budget indicates a shortfall of about $63,000, but this early in the process, it’s unclear what several key expenses are going to be. 

Unity’s school goes up to eighth grade, then local students choose between three high schools: Towle in Newport, Fall Mountain in Langdon, and Stevens High School in Claremont. Each of those schools charges tuition for out-of-district students, which the Unity district reimburses. Claremont school district recently settled on a tuition cost of $15,000 per student; Newport is projected to be higher, and Fall Mountain the same or lower. 

Currently, Unity has 54 high school students spread across the three districts. At the end of the school year, eight eighth graders will move to high school. 

Health insurance costs depend upon staff and may change as the year goes on. Right now, health insurance costs are estimated to be $4,191 less than last year for the Special Education department, but around $7,000 more for other staff. 

Likewise, costs of Special Education (“SpEd”) are always in flux. Sara Lowe, who chairs the budget committee, said SpEd costs are “an unfunded mandate.” 

The district contracts with practitioners to provide speech therapy, occupational and physical therapy, on a part-time basis. For speech and language services, the budget includes $8,000. SpEd High School costs hover around $60,000, and the cost of SpEd elementary students out of district/out of state is sketched in at around $78,000. 

Responding to questions from citizens at the meeting, Lowe said that a student with an Individualized Education Plan, or IEP, comes into the district with that plan in place and it’s the school’s obligation to implement it. What the plan is for a student “is not something we can legally discuss,” she said. 

“The IEP is a legal document,” said Lowe. “For example, if we have a kid come in who needs speech therapy, there is no way we could fund a full-time speech teacher.” 

She also explained, in response to another question from the audience, that special education students are no longer educated separately from mainstream students. They go in the regular classroom with their age group and are pulled out for special services, or have aids to assist them in the classroom. 

Another member of the committee questioned the SpEd teacher’s ability to make unilateral decisions on a student’s education. Lowe responded that is not at all the case. “You can’t make decisions like that; it has to be the team, which includes therapists, teachers, the parents.” 

“It’s federal law,” said Lowe. 

The meeting moved on to discuss replacing technological equipment. The district has been replacing Chromebooks used by students and laptops used by teachers on a three-year plan. The used Chromebooks are now waiting for the district to decide what to do with them: give them away or sell them. 

Lowe commented that Claremont and Fall Mountain issue laptops to all middle and high school students, and the parents pay a fee for insurance. Parents are also responsible for the cost of repairs if their kids break them. 

“There needs to be a level of supervision,” said Unity School Principal Chip Baldwin. “Social media’s brutal.”

The district is also hoping to add an almost-full-time music teacher. Art, Music, and Physical Education lack full-time teachers, and the district is having trouble finding people to teach those subjects on a part-time basis. 

Interim superintendent Keith Pfeifer said Unity has a substitute teaching Phys. Ed., but they are hoping to change that soon, if a new hire works out. 

“The board’s goal is to increase the music teacher from a 0.4 [part time position] to a 0.8,” he said. “It’s 0.4 now, and we can’t find anybody.”