Woodland District 50 gains stimulus cash correction
Gurnee-based Woodland Elementary District 50 has succeeded in gaining its proper allocation of more than $310,000 in federal stimulus funds meant to preserve teaching jobs — money that had been wrongly earmarked for a smaller nearby charter school.
Records show Prairie Crossing Charter Charter School in Grayslake originally was in line for $320,829 from the Education Jobs Fund initiative. Prairie Crossing, with an enrollment of 317 students, is an environmentally focused public choice school in Grayslake within the boundaries of Woodland and Fremont Elementary District 79.
Woodland, with 6,940 pupils, would have received an $85,251 allocation of federal stimulus cash until officials formally complained in the fall to the Illinois State Board of Education in the effort to gain the correct amount of $312,124. Children from within Woodland's borders account for 80 percent of Prairie Crossing's enrollment.
Allocation amounts updated by the state Dec. 8 show Prairie Crossing now will receive $37,756.
Under the original allocation, Prairie Crossing would have received $1,012 per student in federal taxpayers' money, compared to $12 for District 50 and $4 for District 79.
“With the work of our attorneys, we have flipped that switch,” District 50 Superintendent Joy Swoboda said at a recent meeting.
Fremont, with 2,119 students, has been bumped up from $8,620 to $64,820 for its stimulus allocation.
Woodland officials said the stimulus money will be used to pay the salaries of teachers who were targeted for layoffs before the 2010-11 academic year. They said no teachers or administrators will receive bonuses from the allocation.
Stimulus allocations may be used for compensation and benefits and other expenses necessary to retain existing employees or rehire workers, according to the state board of education. Salaries, performance bonuses, health insurance or early retirement incentives are allowed expenditures.
District 50 board member Catherine Campbell questioned why Prairie Crossing should even receive the reduced amount of $37,756 in stimulus funds if it didn't consider layoffs because of financial woes before the school year started.
“Prairie Crossing reduced nobody last year,” Swoboda said. “We reduced 42.5 positions.”
Swoboda said the stimulus allocations for Woodland, Prairie Crossing and Fremont were frozen after the formal complaint was lodged. District 50 board members raised the issue about the original allocations at a meeting in September.
Prairie Crossing board President Geoff Deigan and Director Nigel Whittington could not be reached for comment Wednesday.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced in late August that Illinois would receive $415.4 million from federal taxpayers for school districts across the state. He said there was a sense of urgency to ship the cash from the overall $10 billion in the Education Jobs Fund so thousands of teachers could remain on the job in the 2010-11 school season.
District 50 Associate Superintendent Robert Leonard said the $312,124 from the federal jobs fund will pay the salaries of eight teachers who were identified for layoffs. He said money from Woodland's budget won't be used for the eight instructors the rest of the year.
Jobs fund cash was used to award an $1,100 bonus to each of 345 teachers at Grayslake Elementary District 46, except for those who have officially declared they are retiring and getting 6 percent raises in their final three years to increase pensions. Records show 10 school building administrators received $5,500 bonuses.