Superintendent: Dist. 203 budget supports community priorities

Naperville Unit District 203 plans to dial back spending in a couple of areas next year as enrollment is projected to decline.

But Superintendent Dan Bridges says the proposed $263 million budget still includes funding for programs the community has prioritized, including initiatives to support an increasingly diverse student population and to help freshmen transition into high school.

“I think we've done a nice job of aligning expenditures with priorities in our strategic plan,” Bridges said. “We're putting the money to support the programs that the community told us were important to them.”

Cuts planned to the budget total $3.8 million, while new additions total $564,950, according to a memo from Brad Cauffman, chief financial officer.

Enrollment in the district of roughly 16,500 students is expected to decrease between 5 percent and 8 percent in the next four years, so it plans to employ the full-time equivalent of 14 fewer teachers next year.

The decrease in teachers will come from the usual grouping of retirements and teachers leaving for other positions, spokeswoman Michelle Fregoso said.

“There is turnover in staff each year. Some teachers retire, others move on to other districts, others do not get rehired at ours,” Fregoso said. “So, specifically a layoff due to the budget? Not at this time.”

Hiring fewer teachers will save the district $1.4 million, Cauffman said. Reviewing budgets for each administrative department, operations and maintenance will save $1.9 million more, and the district is decreasing the amount of money it keeps on hand in the education fund for contingencies by $500,000.

The net result is a spending proposal of $263 million with expected revenue of $268.6 million.

Planned spending is roughly in line with last year's budget. Although spending last year was listed at $295.6 million, that included a $34 million state payment made on the district's behalf to the Teachers' Retirement System. The district is not listing that payment as one of its expenses this year. Taking it away from last year's budget, the spending would have been $261.6 million.

The school board will hear a presentation about the budget at 7 p.m. Monday at the administrative center, 203 W. Hillside Road, and a public hearing is scheduled for June 1.

Here is a look at some of the additions to the proposed budget.

Online enrollment

When new families enroll in District 203, they have to visit the administrative center and fill out many forms. But the district proposes spending $60,000 on an online enrollment system that will streamline the process.

“Right now the entire process is done completely by paper, and that requires a ton of data entry by staff after families have completed all those pages of documents by hand,” Fregoso said. “The online system will be easier for families to use and our staff to process.”

The district plans to test the system with summer school registration in 2016 and then roll it out for incoming families in the 2016-17 school year.

Freshmen transition

A program that organizes groups of upperclassmen at each high school to help freshmen transition to their new environment is in line to get funding in next year's budget. Fregoso said Naperville North and Naperville Central have been finding money for the transition program called LINK Crew for the past several years even though it never was allocated.

Now the district proposes dedicating $18,000 toward the program to pay for T-shirts, pizza parties and stipends for faculty sponsors.

PRIDE program

A mentoring intervention program that has been in place for 12 years at Naperville North High School will be starting in the fall at Naperville Central, so the district proposes spending $15,700 to create teacher stipends for PRIDE, which stands for Pursuing Responsibility, Involvement and Dedication through Education.

Angelica Kalat, a reading specialist and coordinator of PRIDE at Naperville North, says the program has four other staff coordinators and more than 60 teachers who serve as mentors to students, many of them blacks or Latinos, who are referred to the program so they can receive additional support. The group plans college visits and large group meetings about leadership along with weekly one-on-one meetings between each student and his or her mentor.

“There's so much involved in providing different types of support for the whole student — that emotional support, that academic support and even that planning piece,” Kalat said.

At Naperville Central, Jason Booker, a school counselor, and Alyssa Sprovieri, a learning behavior specialist, will be leading the program, which Booker said he envisions as a cultural club for black and Latino students. He's hosting focus groups this week with at least 45 students to begin planning for a new way to welcome diversity.

“I thought it would be an opportunity for them (students) as far as a leadership opportunity and an opportunity to increase awareness of diversity on our campus,” Booker said. “This may have been something that the students created on their own eventually, but I certainly don't mind helping to have it get started. I'm enthusiastic about the process.”

New positions

Even while reducing instructional staffing by the equivalent of 14 full-time jobs, the district plans to add the full-time equivalent of 5.5 positions.

Two of them will be math specialists at Steeple Run and Scott elementary schools for $175,000, and another two will be dual-language assistants at Steeple Run and Elmwood elementaries. One will be a speech and language pathologist for the Ann Reid Early Childhood Center and Washington Junior High for $87,500, and the last will be a part-time psychologist for Madison Junior High for $43,750.