Daleville's ‘school system snapshot’ discussed at DBOE

An overview of each school system’s funding and spending is provided by the Alabama Association of Schools Boards to members each year.

Called the “School System Snapshot” the one-page annual report provides AASB member schools with a look at each of the 137 school systems’ state and local resources and how each system compares to state and national funding and spending averages. Every member of the Alabama Legislature and Congressional delegation is also provided with copies of Snapshots for the systems in their districts.

At the Daleville Board of Education meeting March 16 Daleville City Schools Superintendent Dr. Lisa Stamps outlined highlights of the DCS “Snapshot,” which reflects 2020 data.

Of the 138 school systems in Alabama, DCS ranks 103 based on total per pupil federal, state and local revenue sources. “That ranking is not academics,” said Stamps. “It’s not how much we spend. It is our total amount of revenue from federal, state and local funds.

“This ‘snapshot’ is strictly the revenue sources,” she said. “The majority of our funds—66 percent— come from the state, 18 percent is from local sources and 16 percent is from federal sources.”

The number of students in DCS last fiscal year was 1,101 with 69 percent eligible for free and reduced price lunches.

The system had 631 students on 13 bus routes with 92 percent of the buses less than 10 years old, according to the AASB report.

The total per-pupil expenditures for all federal state and local funds in Daleville is $9,505. With the lowest system at $4,602 per pupil expenditure and the highest system with $14,616 per pupil expenditure, the Alabama Average is $10,124.

Stamps said that as with school’s systems across the board some 85 to 90 percent of funding goes towards salaries. “The majority of our funding goes for salaries, the other is spent on benefits and the other is spent on non-personnel operations,” she said.

“Every year the legislators vote on the instructional support funding,” Stamps explained, adding that this year the state school superintendent asked legislators to increase that funding from $700 per teacher to $1,000.

Stamps said that funds for each school system are allocated either per pupil or per teacher. Funding for classroom materials and supplies are allocated per teacher and technology money is allocated per pupil. Library resources are allocated per student as is funding allocations for textbooks.

“We have Educational Advancement and Technology money that the state has been giving school systems over the last few years,” Stamps said. “These one-time supplemental funds may be used for repairs and deferred maintenance, classroom instructional supplies, insurance for facilities, transportation, technology and school safety measures. In Fiscal Year 20, the amount received was was $252,518. In FY 21, it was $307,814. The first year it was given, in FY 19, the amount received was $251,721.

The “School Snapshot: 2022 Edition” containing the FY2020 data, can be viewed at the AASB’s website alabamascholboards.org.

The next meeting of the DBOE is April 20 at 4:30 p.m. in the central office conference room. The meeting is open to the public.