FAQ from ICCSD Residents

(This post will be updated as I add more questions to it. Feel free to make suggestions. I intend each question to be informational with few expression of my opinions, and I try to indicate when I'm expressing my opinion. I encourage you to call me out if I overstep. I do not take any of this to be original to me, and I give a tip of the hat to too many administrators and residents to mention explicitly.)

How does educational funding work for Iowa schools?

The State of Iowa limits the amount of money per student—called spending authority—that school districts can use to fund annual operations and programming. The purpose of the limit on spending authority is noble: It ensures a wealthier area does not have more educational opportunities than a poorer area simply because of its flush tax base. Spending authority is the pot of funds used for annual programming and operations. If a school district does not spend the full amount of its spending authority in a given year, the district is allowed to carry over the remainder to be used in subsequent years as a one-time (rainy-day) fund. In addition to spending authority, in most years, the state will give a supplemental state allocation (SSA), previously called allowable growth, as a percentage increase on the amount allocated the prior year. There are also special categorical funds, such as special education and at-risk funds, that are allocated based on the number of students with needs and the severity of needs. Spending authority, categorical funds, and supplemental state allocation all operate independently of how much a given school district is able to raise via property taxes. Fewer funds raised by property taxes would mean that the state would backfill more of a district’s spending authority. Greater funds raised by property taxes would mean that the state would backfill less. However, the state does not limit one-time funds used for new buildings, athletic fields or building maintenance. A municipality's use of tax-incremental financing (TIF) does not directly affect spending authority, nor does it directly affect SSA. Some people argue that the use of TIFs indirectly affects the state government's decision to limit SSA.

When will Grant and (new) Hoover open?

Longfellow will swing into the (new) Hoover building in 2017-2018 as Longfellow is renovated. In 2018-2019, Mann and Lincoln will simultaneously swing through (new) Hoover as they are both renovated. (new) Hoover and Grant are both scheduled to open in 2019. But (new) Hoover as a building will be completed for 2017 opening as a swing school. Grant will open as a stand-alone attendance area in 2019, which is the same year that (new) Hoover is slated to open as a stand-alone attendance area.

Why does Liberty High School have so much parking in its design?

According to a high-level administrator, the current plan for Liberty High currently has approximately 1,000 parking spots, since “We have to provide 1 spot for each 3.5 seats in the largest assembly space (which is the stadium) plus 1 spot for each faculty member." This is because of a building code requirement, which applies to new construction. Sometimes significant renovations of older buildings may require adherence to current building codes. In any case, the district is aware of the potential issues that these differences may give rise to between our high schools.

Will Liberty High School be inequitable when it opens compared to West and City High?

When Liberty opens in 2017, it will have classrooms for 1,000 students, cafeteria, common spaces, a complete fine arts wing, indoor athletic facilities, and green spaces that will be available for outdoor field-based practices. They will not have classrooms for an extra 500 students, tennis courts, a stadium, or baseball and softball fields until the general obligation bond passes. In the interim, the district and North Liberty are cooperating to temporarily relocate those sports to other facilities in North Liberty. Traveling from school for some extracurricular activities is common at City and West for certain sports (e.g., swimming and baseball among others). My opinion is that the problem will be more acute at Liberty for a couple of years since it will apply to more sports, it will likely be disadvantageous to participation for some as it is at our other schools, and it is certainly not ideal. But it is good that the harm is mostly temporary.

How is the capacity of ICCSD schools calculated?

Capacity calculations are based in part on the square feet in a room and the use of the room. For example, a smaller first grade classroom (in terms of square feet) would have less capacity than a larger first grade classroom. Also, preschool classrooms (based on their use) are not counted as K-12 capacity. But if the use of the preschool classroom were changed to a general education K-12 classroom, then the capacity of the school would increase.

Can we save $500K per year by delaying opening Liberty?

A committee has recommended that Liberty High School open as a comprehensive high school serving all four high-school grades, and the Board of Education has approved that recommendation. The administration has estimated that opening Liberty High School as a comprehensive high school in 2017-2018 rather than as an annex of West High School would add an additional cost of $500K for two years (the 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 school years). The costs would mostly be comprised of coaches and directors of extracurricular programs. Those costs are already accounted in our long-term planning beginning in 2019-2020, so the costs would be a cost of $500K for exactly two years. For one-time expenses like these, it is feasible for the district to use excess spending authority, which is the spending authority that our district chose not to spend in past years and that can be used one time to cover expenses as determined by the district. In my opinion, the district would not be practicing wise stewardship of its resources if it used these resources to pay for on-going expenses, but it is reasonable to the district to use them in cases where the expenses have a clear end date.

How much does it cost to operate a new elementary school? 

The administration estimates that it will take $500,000 to operate our new elementary schools beyond the instructional costs. This figure is based on the projected salary of a principal, librarian, guidance counselor, building secretary, media secretary, custodian care, and utilities cost. The cost to operate a new elementary school beyond the instructional costs is related to but not identical with the savings incurred by closing an elementary school and absorbing those students at other elementary schools.

Secondary Boundaries: Implicit Value Judgments

I've been reflecting on the secondary boundaries offered from the administration in the 2nd and 3rd rounds of deliberation. I have heard a number of criticisms that the maps are driven primarily by an attempt to bring about socioeconomic integration.

I think that is a misunderstanding. Here are some of the value judgments present in secondary maps (alphabetical order):

• capacity (have balanced use of capacity at junior highs and high schools; e.g., the percentage of capacity used at City High should be relatively close to West High and Liberty High)
• demographics (have balanced demographic characteristics, e.g., race, socioeconomic status, English-language learners, and special education students)
• geographic proximity (assign each student to schools are that are closer in walking/driving distance, rather than further away, from that student's residence; this is at the root of the controversy about "islands")
• pyramid feeders (have a pyramid feeder system from one distinct set of elementary schools to Southeast Junior High, another distinct set of elementary schools to Northwest Junior High, and a third to North Central Junior High)
• school size (have approximately the same number of students at each of the junior highs and at each of the high schools)
• straight feeders (have a straight feeder system from North Central Junior High to Liberty High, from Northwest Junior High to West High, and from Southeast Junior High to City High)

Each value judgment mentioned is playing a role in the secondary maps the administration and board is pursuing. I think most of these values are well-founded and based on strong evidence. There is strong evidence that capacity, demographics, geographic proximity, and the size of a school affects academics. We can debate about the relative importance of these values, and we should. BUT, we are missing something that is puzzling to me if that's all we see here.

My question: why are we so committed to straight feeders and pyramid feeders? Many of the most puzzling features of the maps could, at the very least, be minimized if we drew junior high boundaries based on capacity, demographics, geographic proximity, and school size without regard for straight feeding our high schools, and having a pyramid of elementary schools feeding into it. Geographically, we have our current junior highs in strange locations. Two are in the northwest part of the district, and one is in the southeast part, despite the fact that approximately 40% of the district is east of the river, and at least 60 or so percent of the district is in Iowa City. That makes it challenging on its own to balance the four central values with our junior highs. How much harder are we making it with our feeder requirements?

Likewise, I think the puzzling features would be minimized even further if we drew high school boundaries based on the four primary values without regard for a straight feeder from a specific junior high. It's a lot easier to see Twain going to West than to see it go to Northwest. Likewise, it may make sense for Kirkwood to go to Liberty High, but it is rather strange that it wouldn't go to the junior high right next door to it (Northwest Junior High).

One of the reasons this is so puzzling to me is that the pyramid feeder system plus the straight feeder system has no known or purported academic benefit. Yet those two values are the only ones that the board hasn't considered abandoning. The closest they came was when Director Kirschling requested the administration to give maps akin to what I've suggested. The administration never proposed any map that broke the straight feeder system from junior high to high school. The closest they came was the "as the crow flies" map and the "municipality" map proposed in the second round.

The "as the crow flies" map was simply absurd on its face. It looked at geographical proximity in terms of sheer distance without regard for capacity, demographics, or school size, and the geography was considered without regard for geographical boundaries of any type. It violated every single value above except the straight feeder value. 

Likewise, the "municipality" map wasn't really considering the four values of capacity, demographics, geography, and school size versus the feeder models.

I hope the board will request that the administration make separate junior high and high school maps. As it stands, the administration and the board appear to place a higher priority on the feeder system than they do on any of the more important values that pertain to academic matters. Those are the central value judgments being expressed in all of the maps presently considered. I think that's a mistake and the board should reconsider it. At the very least, they should have information that shows how such a proposal would pose few, if any, benefits regarding capacity, demographics, geographical proximity, or school size.

UPDATE (3/20/2015): The board commissioned research about feeder patterns last year (see here). First, I don't see a definitive reason in it to prefer our current feeder model if the alternative is superior in terms of the four-other values. Second, the report applies research that is primarily about student mobility (repeatedly changing schools during high school and the like) and "transitions" (i.e., 8th graders going from junior high to high school, versus 8th graders staying in the same school when the 9th grade is at the same location) to feeder models. On a quick glance, I saw very few studies talking about feeder patterns, and one of the studies that did note advantages to a linear model (which is not our model) noted that its small sample size may affect its statistical significance.