Montgomery County Public Schools officials are estimating a year-end budget surplus of roughly $7.6 million largely due to lower-than-anticipated enrollment, according to its latest budget report.
MCPS spokesman Brian Edwards said 2006-07 enrollment was about 138,000 students, about 2,000 less than projected by school officials.
“The new rate of births in the county is pretty steady, but there is a trend of some school-age families moving elsewhere,” Montgomery County Council Education Chairman Mike Knapp said. “This could be an affordable housing thing with families moving to places like Frederick to get more house for their money.”
The latest estimate is based on fiscal 2007 information through the end of April and projects a budget surplus of $300,000 more than an MCPS report issued at the end of March.
The bulk of the expected surplus comes from a savings of $4.5 million in instructional salaries. Some teacher and educator positions held in reserve were never filled due to lower enrollment.
Enrollment has increased by 1,100 students, however, in the English for Speakers of Other Languages program, bringing the total number of ESOL students to 14,718.
Additional teaching positions were allocated to meet those needs.
The report also said MCPS’ special education budget anticipates a $1.3 million surplus because of higher-than-anticipated Medicaid reimbursements and the use of long-term substitutes to fill some special education positions.
“The biggest challenge there is that the teachers just don’t exist,” Knapp said. “They are the most difficult positions to fill throughout the country. There’s not a huge percentage of people getting degrees in special education, and the challenges of teaching that population lead to higher turnover just because it’s hard.”
Knapp said he believes Montgomery County has done a better job of finding full-time staff to teach special education students than many other schools have, but they are still trying to find more full-time staff.
Montgomery County Council of Parent-Teacher Associations President Jane de Winter said there is a lot of concern from parents of special education students about finding full-time staff, but she believes the schools are trying to address the problem and that the shortage of certified teachers “goes beyond Montgomery County.”
