Wednesday, November 16, 2011

School Finance Week 1

Comparison of Austin ISD Improvement Plan and Crowley ISD Improvement Plan:
With the exception of Appendix B PBMAS, the Austin ISD does not link direct funding to specific activities in an easy to read format.  The Austin ISD Improvement Plan gives a great deal of detail to meeting minutes, and specific notes, and also gives a overall general budget by category, but for Compensatory Funds it lists basic programs and positions funded with no explanation of detail and expected outcomes.  External Grants/Federal Funds are given a direct source, but once again does not give specific expectations and desired outcomes.  The PBMAS Appendix B does give specifics regarding goals, measurable evidence, specific activities, funding and resources, and timeline.  I would expect this format to be utilized for other Goals and Objectives as well.  Crowley ISD has taken a more activity based approach to the improvement plan process.  CISD lists specific goals, objectives, performance indicators, evaluation tools, and funding sources for each activity.  CISD also includes a list of Federal Funding Sources at the end and the general expenditure group to utilize the funds.  Action Plans are developed for each objective and goal that lists the activity/strategy, Title I Component, Timeline, Responsible Staff, and Resources/Funding.  Crowley ISD does not address PBMAS as a separate section, but rather embeds the expectations within the specific activities for each of the goals and objectives.

I believe the PBMAS portion of the AISD Improvement Plan is comparable to the CISD Improvement Plan.  I believe this format would make the rest of the AISD plan much easier to understand, and would show direct correlation between funding and goals.  The AISD format is cumbersome to get through.  CISD utilizes a narrative format that bullets items and also includes a table that correlates goal activities with specific source of funding, which I believe is the intent of Improvement Plans.

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