The appropriate fund to examine is the Combined General Fund. This fund includes grant monies as well as appropriated funds. These grant revenues are important to the school district. For example, Title I and Individuals With Disability Education Act (IDEA) funds are included in the Combined General Fund but not in the General Fund. Expenditures from the Combined General Fund were $196.0 million in FY 2008, which is the most recent year for which an audited report is available.

The AAPS passes the funds it allocates to the Capital Needs Fund (CNF) through the Combined General Fund. The CNF provides for upkeep of the capital, that is, physical structures, of the district. These expenditures are not typically thought of as part of the “operating budget” but rather as more akin to expenditures from the Sinking Fund and Bond Fund budgets, which have accounts completely separate from the Combined General Fund. Reinforcing this view, there is no place in the detailed Combined General Fund accounts for CNF expenditures other than “Transfer To Other Funds”. In FY 2008 AAPS transferred $5.0 million from the Combined General Fund to the CNF. The correct base for computing proportions within the operating budget is thus $191.0 million.

Rounding of estimates from more detailed figures may cause the sum of the details to differ slightly from totals in the following discussion.

“Total Instruction” as defined by accounting rules (all subsequent accounting categories also follow well defined and legally mandated definitions) includes the classroom instruction of general education students and some of the services to special needs students. Expenditures on total instruction were $110.2 million or 58 percent of total operating expenditures.

“Pupil Support Services” includes some services focused on all students, such as guidance and counseling, and many services provided primarily to special needs students, for example, teacher consultants focused on one or a few students, health and psychological services, and social work services. These services are an important part of the educational program focused directly on students. Expenditures on these services were $22.5 million or 12 percent of total operating expenditures.

The account “Transfer To Other Funds” includes expenditures on a variety of student activities, such as athletics, commonly termed “extra curricular”. These activities are focused directly on students and are an important component of the educational experience. These expenditures were $3.3 million or 2 percent of total operating expenditures.

“Support Services – Instructional Staff” include services focused directly on instructional staff, including media (library) staff as well as professional development. This account does not include the cost of principals and other school administration. These services are focused directly on students (media centers) or on teachers. These services are key components of a well-rounded, sustainable excellent educational program. The expenditures on these services were $9.1 million or 5 percent of total operating expenditures.

Expenditures on principals and their support staff in the school buildings, called “School Administration” in official accounts, were $11.5 million or 6 percent of the total. Research shows unequivocally the importance of principals. Much evidence also identifies secretaries and other support staff as key people in creating a building climate conducive to productive partnerships with students and their parents or guardians.

Up to this point we have identified expenditures of $156.6 million, equal to 82 percent of the total, that support AAPS staff with direct responsibilities for the learning of students.

“Operations and Maintenance” and “Pupil Transportation” are overhead expenses required to place students in the classroom and to make classrooms good environments for learning and teaching. These expenditures include, for example, bus driver salaries, fuel for buses, natural gas for heating, electricity, and telephone. While these expenditures are not directly related to instruction, no one argues instruction would be unharmed if we markedly reduced these expenditures, for example, set thermostats at 55 degrees in the winter or eliminated bus service. These expenditures were $26.2 million or 14 percent of total operating expenditures.

The district spent slightly less than $1.0 million on “Community Services,” which is about 0.5 percent of the total. Much of this was spent by Community Education and Recreation, a.k.a. Rec & Ed. Rec & Ed programs in service to the larger community are self-supporting by design and district policy. The after-school child-care program, which is a direct service to students and their parents or guardians, operates at a deficit.

The remaining accounts apply to central administration. “General Administration” includes the superintendent and his core staff and the Board of Education ($1.6 million). “Business Services” and “Central Activities” include those services related to payroll, procurement, human resources, research and evaluation, and other similar services ($5.7 million). These two accounts total $7.3 million or 4 percent of total operating expenditures.