School district concerned about funding as enrollment remains low

Blaine school district enrollment continues to drop this school year. Since September, the school district has lost students each month – 11 total from December to January – so many that enrollment is down 75 students from what the district planned for this year.

If this trend continues, it will affect district funding, Amber Porter, executive director of finance and operations, said in a January 25 Blaine school board meeting.

“Even if we stayed right where we’re at for the next five months, you’re going to see [the enrollment average] be pulled down, which affects certain things; apportionment for this year and, potentially, future levy collections,” Porter said. She added that the decline in enrollment will also make planning a budget for next year difficult.

Porter did not have a breakdown of where these students are going but listed possibilities such as homeschooling, moving out of the district and transferring to private schools. “I think we’ve all heard families that have gone to private schools that were open in the fall,” Porter said.

The good news is that due to the pandemic, the district is spending less, Porter said. It’s been careful about spending on extra hours of staff training and substitutes, she said.

“We’ve been trying to be really fiscally responsible throughout this whole process,” superintendent Christopher Granger told board members. The district has reduced expenditures by about 3.25 percent, while the decline in enrollment has been about 3.5 percent, Granger said.

The district is also receiving apportionment based on its overestimated budgeted enrollment, Porter said, so it’s built up some reserves.

At this point, Porter said she couldn’t provide numbers on how the decline in enrollment would affect next year’s budget, but she would have estimates to share with the board by the end of the week.

With the state legislature back in session, Granger said he, along with superintendents across the state, will be asking the legislature to ensure stable funding to the school districts across the state, as enrollment is down statewide.

Granger encouraged board members to encourage local state representatives to allow for flexibility in the legislation and avoid tying specific application requirements that some schools may already be meeting to Covid-19 federal stimulus money.

Granger said he hopes to see the legislature put in protections for school transportation and enrollment funding. He said the Blaine school district has about one-eighth of the bus drivers it would have during a normal year, and if the state legislature doesn’t account for that change in funding, districts’ transportation budget statewide may not be able to pay for the amount of drivers needed when schools return to full capacity.

He advised that basing funding off 2019-20 budgets would be more representative of the school’s needs if they return to full in-person learning by fall.

“There’s just a lot of unknown for ’21-22,” Granger said. “We’re already planning for next year. We have to start making decisions about courses, about staffing, and it’s really important we’re in tune with what’s going on in Olympia because it’s going to have an impact this year.” Granger added that the district and board may have to make difficult decisions before they have answers from the legislature.

Granger reminded board members that about 60 percent of the state’s student population is in Snohomish and King counties, which only have kindergarten students back in the classroom. When representatives and advocates discuss “getting kids back into schools” and say “schools need to be open,” he said to remember the Blaine school district and Whatcom County are further ahead with all grades in face-to-face instruction.

Only 5 percent of school districts in the state are open to students grade 6 and above, according to a survey by the Washington Office of Superintendent of Public Information.

Granger also asked for board members to advocate for reevaluating the social distancing requirement in schools. If the Washington State Department of Health doesn’t change the six-foot rule in the classroom, he said Blaine schools cannot return to full in-person learning by fall 2021 and would be forced to remain in hybrid learning due to lack of space. Granger warned this could affect enrollment next year.

The school board passed a memorandum that will continue to offer emergency paid sick leave for teachers who test positive for Covid-19. If a teacher fails their daily Covid-19 assessment, they will be asked to take time off. If a teacher tests positive for Covid-19, they will quarantine for the required two weeks and be paid for that time before returning to school.

The board also adopted a calendar that will move the first day of school to September 1 for the 2021-22 school year, with the school year ending in mid-June.