I have had time to digest the information that was presented to public in the first draft presentation of the 2009 Franklin Public School budget. Especially the excellent Blog Report and suggestions made by FranklinNOW blogger Janet Evans. I admire her tenacity and dedication as to reporting and participating in the Franklin Public School meetings.
From the reports that came from other bloggers who attended the meeting one thing stood out that disturbs me, was the opinion of Superintendent Patz on funding extracurricular activities by increasing fee’s. I hope this is not a reaction that all School Board members feel the same.
FranklinNOW blogger Greg Kowalski reported:
Superintendent Patz and at least one Board member (I forgot whom exactly) didn't like the idea of fee increases, stating that the increases would lead to discrimination of students based on how much they (or their families) can afford, and that it will end up negligible in the end. I'll profoundly disagree.As a member of a 5-member household, with 2 very active younger sisters, I know firsthand of some extra-circular activities. Volleyball, basketball, summer camp, dancing, gymnastics, etc, etc, etc. All those cost money, and I can assure anyone that my family isn't the wealthiest in Franklin. We afford it, and it's what my sisters want to do. I stood in agreement with Board President Dave Szychlinski when he talked about his own family and daughters, and how he'd be more than happy to pay the extra fees if some of things they took were offered at FPS. I believe many families would join my own and the Szychlinski's.
I do not understand the not-thinking-outside-the-box attitude Patz is taking on this issue. A simple change to funding extracurriculars would allow for a parent that can not afford to pay the fees for the extracurriculars could simply fill out a form (such as the one for subsidized lunch) to allow the school system to subsidize that student for the extracurricular activity. Considering the average family income in the City of Franklin, I would tend to doubt that this would be a large financial burden on the FPS budget but the increased fees would help defray costs to actually pay to educate our children.
I totally agree with Greg’s statement:
FPS needs to prioritize their budget for the taxpayers in this rough time for our economy. Do they support academics, or athletics? I'd like to use common sense and take academics as the top priority, so we should focus on other alternatives to fund athletics.
Superintendent Patz, please don’t start telling us what we can’t do, start thinking of more ways that we can keep the budget down, even if it means unpopular fees to people who use a FPS service that is non-academic. That's not WAGGING THE DOG, that is just Common Sense.
On a positive note, the Board is doing a great job at keeping the taxpayer informed and involving them in the budget process.
Kudos to them to realize this is crucial especially in rough economic times.
