Administrative Restructuring Plan Announced

Administrative Restructuring Plan Announced

At last night's school board session, Dr. Ridder announced an administrative restructuring plan that cuts over $1 million in positions from central office staff. The cuts include:

- Continuous Classroom Improvement Facilitators (aka ISSI, 3 positions): $235,000

- Deputy Superintendent of Operations: $161,322

- Assistant Director of Facilities: $104,019

- Director of Leadership Development: $98,820

- Community Relations (2 positions): $90,000

- Manager of Human Resources: $77,476

- Coordinator of Attendance: $73,722

- Assistant Director of Transportation: $67,597

- Senior Project Manager: $63,330

- Administrative Assistant--Middle Schools: $49,806

- Associate Superintendent-Title I/Special Education: $47,366

- Board Secretary: $12,789

Dr. Ridder pointed out that these cuts were made in order to focus on the "key elements" of class size and teacher compensation, and emphasized - along with several board members - that the cuts would be temporary in nature until the economy rebounds. Exactly how and where duties from eliminated positions will be distributed to sites and other central office staff is not yet clear.

There were many board comments of concern that these administrative cuts "will directly impact support to staff, students and the entire community", as Dr. Ridder warned in earlier emails to staff. Dr. Hoeman stated that the cuts were in no way a justification that we have too many administrators in our district, and warned that the cuts could affect student achievement. Kris Callen expressed her concern about cuts to Professional Development, stating that the district has a responsibility to help teachers become what they want to be. Tom Prater pointed out that our new teacher attrition rate had been drastically reduced due to the Step Up program. Board President, Gerry Lee, perhaps summed it up best when he stated that, regardless of the cuts, we still have 24,000 students to educate. Lee went on to laud SPS teachers for their hard work in making us a successful district.

District leadership has repeatedly pointed out that Springfield already had the highest student-to-administrator ratio among the five largest school districts in the state. It's interesting to note that St. Louis and Kansas City school districts, both of which are enduring major budget and accreditation issues, ranked among the highest in the concentration of administrators per student. Looking at the administrator/student ratio in districts across the state, SNEA can find no clear evidence to support the notion that simply having more administrators positively affects a district's performance.

However, it is clear that cutting central leadership positions in any large organization will translate into more decision-making and responsibility at the local level - in our case, the building level. It is a virtual certainty that principals, office staff and professional staff will absorb many new responsibilities and possess more autonomy in the daily operation and instruction in their respective buildings. These kinds of adjustments may take some time to play out, but the relatively "gloomy" picture created by some board members about the loss of services and support may prove to be premature. SPS professional staff have proven their resilience through good times and bad in sustaining our high-performing district, and a little more autonomy in the classroom may provide better results than some in district leadership are expecting.

Other Observations and Comparisons

Springfield - the state's largest accredited district - is unique among the state's larger districts on several fronts. While SPS teachers are the lowest paid of the largest five districts (only St. Joseph has lower average salaries of the largest 22 districts) student performance compares very favorably. Our free and reduced lunch population has reached a tipping point of 50%, yet student performance, at least based on state test scores, meets or exceeds those of surrounding districts. Given all these factors, Springfield is certainly a high performing district, and our dedicated professional staff deserves a huge amount of credit for this.

Down by the Levy

Of the five largest districts in the state, Springfield has by far the lowest operating levy and average teacher salaries. Springfield's school tax levy is even low for our tax-stingy corner of the state. Citizens in Nixa, Ozark, Branson, Willard and Republic have all approved higher school tax levies than Springfield's. Further, our district operates with one of the lowest reserves in the state (10% or less). For example, if Springfield had the same reserve percentage as Nixa (an incredible 30% - and they still froze salaries!), SPS would have had $60 million to work with when the economy went south.

There is no question that SPS has always operated a budget that was close to the bone, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there hasn't been room for administrative cuts over the years. The focus has not always been on providing adequate support, financially and otherwise, to the teachers, counselors, librarians, nurses and support staff who work daily with the students. To that end, Dr. Ridder, his cabinet and the board deserve a great deal of credit for establishing that support during these difficult economic times.