This is why Mountain States Policy Center recommends lawmakers adopt a Public School Transparency Act. This simple step would help taxpayers and parents determine whether their local district has enough funds and whether it is properly spending the cash in the classroom.

 

As part of this idea, all public school districts would be required, both on the first page of their budget and also on the front page of the district’s main website, to report six simple things:

 

1. Amount of total dollars (all funds – local, state and federal) spent by the district that year

2. Amount of total dollars spent per student, per year

3. Amount & percentage of total dollars allocated to average classroom

4. Average administrator salary & benefits

5. Average teacher salary & benefits

6. Ratio of administrators to teachers to students

 

Some schools may go further, reporting student outcomes, teacher retention rates and more.

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Very little extra work would be needed to provide this data and make it accessable on paper and online. Most districts already have it somewhere in their budget documents. They know where to look, whereas parents and taxpayers can get lost. In the interest of transparency, school districts should be eager and willing to share this information with the public in a clear, concise manner.

 

Parents and taxpayers may see this data and conclude their school districts need more resources. Others may see it and believe that not enough is being done to spend money in the classroom. Regardless, the community will have a broader sense of the results being achieved, and what – if any – changes need to be made.

 

As we wait for legislative action, Mountain States Policy Center presents this first edition of the Public School Transparency Index for school districts in Idaho. The data contained in this report comes directly from state and district resources, reports and budgets. The data includes:

 

• Graduation rates

• Teacher retention rates

• Chronic absenteeism rates

• Idaho Standards Achievement Test (ISAT) data

• Top and bottom performing schools in each district

• Total financial resources in district

• Financial resources available per student

• Average teacher salaries

• Superintendent salaries

• Percentage of district employees who are teachers

• Teacher to student ratios

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Full reports from Montana, Wyoming and Washington will come in subsequent years.

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KEY FINDINGS

 

1. When including all funds, only seven Idaho school districts have resources 

of less than $10,000 per student, per year

2. Teachers make up at least 50% of the total district staffing in just one-third of 

Idaho school districts

3.  At least 17 Idaho superintendents receive a yearly salary higher than the 

Governor of the state ($151,400)

4. The average teacher salary exceeds $60,000 per year in just 15 districts statewide

5. There is no correlation between higher district spending and student outcomes in the district

 

RESEARCH NOTE

 

The information contained in this study represents the latest available data obtained by Mountain States Policy Center via official sources – the state of Idaho’s Department of Education, publicly available state data, and school district budgets. A school district’s total resources may include local, state and federal funding, as well as balances transferred from previous years and various other funds not necessarily meant for daily instruction.

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Unfortunately, the layout of school district budgets in Idaho are not standardized. In fact, MSPC researchers found at least five different budget formats – making it more difficult to accurately contrast each district’s resources – thus, the reason for an index and a uniform reporting method.

 

Education data is updated frequently. Therefore, the information contained in this report represents only a snapshot in time and is subject to periodic change. Data containing an asterisk is considered incomplete. A school district’s current financial transparency is based on the availability, ease and depth of clearly-marked budget postings online.

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Public charter schools are not included in this report. Nothing contained in this study shall be construed as an attempt to aid or hinder the passage of any legislation.

 

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