October 9, 2024 • 31 mins
Matt Palaoro sits down with Brenna Copeland, Chief Financial Officer for Jeffco Public Schools to break down school finances.
Brenna’s expertise and sense of humor make navigating school funding and budgets manageable! In this episode you will learn:
- How public school districts like Jeffco are funded
- How schools develop their budgets and decide where to allocate funds
- Ways that you, as a parent or student, can get involved in budgeting decisions by voicing what matters most to your school community
- And more!
If you’ve ever wondered how schools get funded and how that impacts your community, don’t miss this episode. It’s not just numbers—it’s about shaping the future of education in a way that makes sense for everyone.
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Episode Transcript
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My name is Matt Calero and welcome to Elevate Education. Welcome back, everyone. I'm your host, Matt Palermo. And today we have a very special guest who plays a crucial role in shaping the future of education in the district. We're thrilled to welcome Brant Copeland, Chief Financial Officer for Jeffco Public Schools. Brenner brings a wealth of knowledge, get it? A wealth of knowledge and experience to the table, overseeing the financial operations and budgetary decisions for one of Colorado's largest school districts. In this episode, Brenner will help us navigate the complexities of public school financing, sharing how school districts are funded, how budgets are developed, and the challenges and opportunities that come with managing educational finances. Brenna, it's fantastic to have you on the podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today. Why don't we just get started by having you introduce yourself a little bit? Tell us why you got into this role, what you're most excited about, so on and so forth. Awesome. Thank you so much, Matt. It's really a pleasure to be here. My background spans different parts of education and finance because I've worked in sort of everything from investment banking to district strategies for school improvement and many things in between. One thing I love, is the opportunity to engage more with our schools and look beyond numbers to student experiences. Just a quick, fun fact about me when I'm not poring over my Excel spreadsheets. I like to do woodworking and I'm about to finish a pretty groovy demo loan table for my living room. Oh, interesting. Now, hold on. I've never heard a CFO say, look beyond the numbers. Can you tell me a little bit more about that? I believe that budgets are really just a manifestation of a plan. And while there are numbers on a page, it really is a story. It's a story about what are we doing for students, where and how. And that's what gets me excited. That's what I try and highlight for the board on a year over year basis is what's really changing. What are we doing different and how will that look for our students here in Jeffco? Interesting is something that I think our listeners might like to know more about is how public school districts are funded. So could you maybe start with just giving us a little bit of an overview of what that looks like? Absolutely. So school districts are publicly funded from a mix of property taxes at the local level and also income and sales taxes at the state level. So we are a government entity providing a public good and therefore we're basically tax supported. About 75% of our funding is determined by a formula set by our state legislature and approved by the governor. Of course, this formula establishes a per student funding level that is then multiplied by our count of students. While the formula itself is really complicated. It is stable and predictable, which is very helpful when our district is trying to hire and retain great teachers and staff. About 16% of our funding comes from additional voter approved property taxes, meaning the voters have said, we will give you additional money above and beyond sort of what we have to those support very important programs in Jeffco and they are truly supplemental. So the money we get through that formula that I mentioned, the rest of funding comes from state or federal grants. Also some special revenues, things like our school lunch program and then some miscellaneous things like school fees and my favorite investment earnings. That's pretty much the snapshot. Okay. I got to ask, what are investment earnings? This is where our money makes money and doesn't do anything. And I will say the inflation we've all had to face prices in the grocery store has been not so great. The district has been earning some interest on our deposits, which has provided some one time funds towards really important projects. Interesting. Now, something else you talked about is supplemental funding or what I understand to be additional funds that taxpayers might approve. Would that be something like a mill levy or a bond or something that shows up during an election season? Absolutely. So there's really two types of metal levees that have to do with the school district, maybe three. The first one is. What we call base mill levees. And that's a mill levee, by the way, is just a rate. It's a very fancy word for a rate and a tax increment rate. And so there's a base rate that everyone has to pay. What we sometimes referred to as overrides is that no levee override, additional amount. I just spoke to and though it's jargony, it really just means additional money. And the third type would be funds very specific to borrowing. So if the district borrows or taxpayers have to approve that and they may pass something called a bond. And that bond comes with a separate mill levy. So a very dedicated mill levy or a rate of taxation that then goes towards paying off the debt. Wow. I never knew that. So let me jump in to kind of this topic of budgeting. How does Jeffco Public Schools approach budgeting and financial planning, and what are some of the key priorities when creating a school district budget? Yeah. Our number one priority is always our people. Salaries and benefits expense makes up about 87% of what we spend in Jeffco. You know, not my salary alone, to be clear. So for all the fancy jargon, the district's budget boils down to a very simple equation. How many people will we employ and how much do we pay them? Which actually reminds me of one of my favorite jokes. Matt, let's hear it. How much does a pirate pay for corn? I don't know, Verna. How much does the pirate pay? A buccaneer. So when we do get around to our budgeting process, obviously one unique thing is that a school district is really operating out of so many different sites, a.k.a. our schools. And each school runs a little bit like a mini business that is part of a larger franchise. Our budgeting process reflects the fact that school leadership teams have the best line of sight into what needs to happen in their building. So we try to give schools as much decision making as possible over how their budgets are deployed. Sabrina, you mentioned that 87%, I think somewhere around that range is invested in our people out in our schools. Could you get super granular, kind of elaborate on that a little bit more? What does that mean? So that means that each year we produce approximately 14,000 W-2 reports, which is your annual earnings statement. So in one way, shape or form, 14,000 humans do something for our students here in Jeffco. Now, about 2000 of those folks are generally our guest teachers, really, really important folks who stand down when we have teacher absences. We love and appreciate our guest teachers, but they make up a big chunk. We also have quite a few coaches who may not be an educator full time, but they're supporting our students in these important activities. When you take that 14,000 down to about 9000, that's how many full time folks we have in the district within the 9000. About 5000 are licensed teachers, meaning that in the state of Colorado they can perform a teaching function in their specific discipline. So that is the biggest chunk, although obviously between the 9000 and the 5000, you have about 4000, and that covers everything else we do. Student success has some folks who are not licensed educators, for example, who are providing supports in schools, but all of our operations. So all of our food and nutrition services are bus drivers, our mechanics, our maintenance folks, the folks who clear the snow when we get those snowstorms. All of them are also represented in that 4000 number. So when it's all said and done, you have you know, we have 130 ish principals in the district. Those would be school leaders. And that sort of balloons back up to the big number of the 14,000. Regarding school budgets, when money is allocated in support of the school. Are there parameters that principals or school leaders have to adhere to when spending their money? And what are some of those things that someone who isn't responsible for managing a school budget might not know about? Yep. So your question really highlights one of the unique things that Jeffco does with our resource allocation. So a traditional approach in the past would allocate to a school. Effectively a position as opposed to dollars. And this is sort of it's sometimes referred to as a staffing allocation approach. Instead, we give schools dollars based on enrollment, and those dollars are adjusted as well to reflect some unique needs of students. The school leader then takes those dollars and makes decisions about what positions to fund or not fund. And this, in effect, really localizes the decision making to the school site and creates some flexibility. So school leaders actually have quite a bit of decision making. And to your point parameters. So what are the parameters? Those are guidelines that we provide sometimes in the form of we've agreed to a standard or expectation with one of our bargaining units who has said it's really important to provide this type of person in this type of school. And therefore, we try and do that on a minimum basis. Other times it's just best practice, you know, how many teachers do you need per a set of students in a classroom, etc.? So there are guidelines we publish, but there is flexibility at the school level. Excellent. And do schools also have other types of costs that are just associated with, say, running a school building like operational cost? How is that managed? And is that something separate from a school budget that the district takes care of, or is that a part of the principal's role to manage all of that? Well, the good news is our mini businesses don't actually have to manage every aspect of, for example, our custodial services or grounds maintenance or facility maintenance. Those are all pretty obvious and intuitive things that we manage out of a department. Right. There's a person with great expertize for how to do that particular service and therefore their employees do that. And school leaders don't have to think about it. A lesson to it of sort of allocation or service provided in our schools is actually within student success. As I know you know, we have specialized professionals doing a number of different important roles in schools, supporting students directly that are not part of the school budget. Okay. Now getting to the good stuff. So you kind of gave me an understanding of the different types of funding sources that come in to a school district and how we make decisions in terms of allocating funds out to schools. Can you maybe share some examples of how budget has directly impacted schools within Jeffco? Absolutely. So students may not always be aware of the ways that their school budget impacts their day to day, but it definitely does. So, for example, a school leader could decide to invest some of their budget allocation into additional foreign language courses or instructors, because that's something that's important for their school community. Courses like computer programing or other electives really are offered in different places of the district based on what school communities in those different areas of the district want Likewise, school leaders determine how many staff to hire. So back to this question of how many students are in a classroom, it has to do with how many teachers we hire. And so really a student who's sitting in a room with fewer students knows that their principal has prioritized hiring teachers. A student who's in a larger classroom may recognize, therefore, that their principal has prioritized offering additional electives or specialty courses with some of their budget. Interesting. What trends or changes are you seeing in the financial resources for public school districts, if any at all? So the good news is that here in Jefferson County, we have a strong economy and a residential population that is growing slightly each year. This means that our schools are part of an overall economic picture that is strong, and this helps with state and local tax collections. That said, though, the total population is increasing, the number of school age children in Jefferson County has been declining for a decade. We currently serve about 12% fewer students than we did eight years ago. This is in spite of new residential development that many folks are aware of in certain parts of Jeffco. This overall trend means that we are receiving less money on an inflation adjusted basis than we were before because that student count has gone down. The good news is it takes fewer people to serve fewer students. So really the task is to make sure we adjust wherever necessary to maintain our vibrant programing in schools. So going back to what you said earlier, what I think I understood is that a lot of school funding is dependent on the total student enrollment of a school district. And when you have less enrollment, that often results in less funding, and therefore you have to right size budgets. So as a district leader, when you being chief financial officer, what might be some ways or some advice that you might have for school leaders out there faced with these difficult budgetary decisions? Where do you start? So we're going to work together as a community to really make sure that each aspect of our budget, each area where we spend money, aligns to the priorities we hold as a school community. It really is an overall pool of resources that we share. One of the things I like to point out sometimes is there's no difference between schools and the district. The district includes our schools and they exist as a part of the district. So when we spend in different places of our budget, which may seem like spending at the district level versus at the school level, it's really all the same dollar. So we will need to come together as a community and say, are the ways that we're spending collectively our most important priorities. And if not, how can we adjust? Those are really difficult decisions. You know, sometimes when I'm looking at my budget, I'm really I've really started to shift my thinking. And you've supported me in this. And what kind of outcomes are we getting for kids given this financial investment? And I know that's a very business way to think about finances, but the reality is, is we're here to serve kids and improve outcomes for kids. So really looking at our budgets to think about what kind of outcomes we're getting as a result of those investments is important. Something that I've been wondering about that I think our listeners might like to know more about is what's one thing about managing school district finances that might surprise people outside of the field? So I go back to my point that I think it's actually simple. It really though we have a 1.3 billion annual spend. It really comes down to how many people do we need to do what we do for students and community and how much do we pay them? And though we buy supplies and materials and we pay for other things, it really is that fundamental question that everyone sort of understands. We provide a service delivered by humans, and so people are everything about our budget. Speaking of budget, tell me who's responsible for approving the budget. The Board of Education actually has the sole right and responsibility to approve the budget. Now they delegate to the superintendent the ability to make changes within a set appropriations. So all year long we can operate and adjust a little where need be. But the board ultimately has to say go forth and spend. Wow. You know, when I think about my own budget, I tend to think of it through, like checking savings and credit. Now, does the district have what I would refer to as like a savings account, like a rainy day fund? I know that's maybe not the exact way we would describe it, but that's what I think about personally with my own money. How does the district think about savings? Is that even a thing? It's definitely a thing. First and foremost, I'm going to put in a plug for Tabor, since obviously the district appreciates being TABOR compliant. We do maintain a 3% mandatory reserve and the state limits the conditions through which we can access that reserve. So and the limits are so severe that I don't actually know of a case where a school district has used their TABOR reserve, but it always exists. On top of that, the board says we should have at least 4% in what's called unassigned reserves. So this would be the part of your savings account or your piggy bank that you don't actually know what you're going to do with it yet, like the emergency fund, so to speak. Exactly. But there's certain things in our piggy bank that we do know what we're going to do with them. And those are called assigned reserves. And that just means they have a specific purpose, either this year or next year. So one example is our schools who budget each year may or may not spend their entire budget. And like you or I, if we don't spend our entire budget, there's something left over. That leftover ultimately shows up as a district reserve. But we say to the schools, Hey, you can tap into this next year if you need it, and that becomes an assigned reserve of the district. So it's definitely part of our reserves, but it's very much tied specifically to that school location. So would a school district consider using a reserve in a situation where maybe something that, you know, maybe something comes up that you hadn't budgeted for that you need money for? So like in my life, for example, I just went and had some car repairs made on my car and those were completely unexpected. So I actually had to transfer money from my savings over to my checking account to pay for that bill. Are there situations like that where school or a department or even the district as a whole has to make some of those kind of budgetary decisions and adjustments as the year progresses? Yeah, so typically we try not to dip into reserves in Shroyer, but if we are going to use our savings, we try to tell the board in advance and ask for their permission and explain how is this thing? We're going to pay for it. Okay, car repairs, how is that going to contribute to the overall quality and how do we make sure it happens once, not every year? And so last year on a couple of different occasions, we talked to the board about needing to rebuild Fletcher Miller. And the board very specifically said, hey, we have some reserves available. This is a one time use. We want to deploy a certain amount of our reserves towards building this building, which is not sort of you don't have to pay for it every year. You pay for it once. So that's an example. That's a great example. How do you as a CFO, advisor, board or advisor or superintendent around things like community engagement? I heard you mentioned earlier that there's a community aspect to budgeting and we're ultimately in service to the kids and our community and of course, the community as taxpayers So what does that look like from your perspective? So I want to put in a plug for our financial transparency website, though it's required by law. I actually think it's really informative and helpful and I just double checked. If you type in to Google Jeffco Public Schools, financial transparency, it is the top result in Google. So you can click right through to it. Now that website has each budget we adopt every year. And I do want to mention there's more details about how we spend our money in each of those budget documents The budget documents are probably 80 ish pages long and it's a nice PDF. There's some charts, there's some data about the total number of people we employ in different positions. For those folks who want to explore a little more deeply. But engaging with the public, in my opinion, is really all about transparency. And so whenever we present to anyone, whether it's the board parents, the District Accountability Committee. A financial advisory committee, which is a separate committee of our community members who volunteer their time and meet with myself. My staff go over our finances in great detail whenever we present to them. Our goal is be as clear and succinct as possible because that enables folks to engage in the course stuff. And the course stuff is really. Who are we employing? What are they doing for our kids? And are those structures that we would also leverage as school leaders? So like, is that where like the parent advisory committee fits into the role of a school? And is that something that a principal would engage their school staff in at a staff meeting? Or how does that look for a principal to engage their community around their budget? Yeah. So the best way for a parent to engage who really wants to influence how we spend money is to join their School Accountability Committee. We sometimes refer to it as the sack, which I always think of as the lunch sac. But actually it's the group of parents who help the principal make the budget each year. And they actually have quite a bit of influence because they're a sounding board for the principal. One school I know of, one of our middle schools every year, goes to her SAC and says, Do we still want to run seven periods a day instead of six? Because it changes the way we staff and resource our building and the parents say Yay or nay. He literally holds a vote with his school accountability committee and that drives his plan for the coming year. And so it's a wonderful way at the local level or at the school level to have input and how the money is spent. this raises another interest of mine, and that is how does legislation impact the school district budget? For example, if there's a new House bill that's passed into law that requires a school district to do something, sometimes I understand that might come with funding and sometimes it doesn't. So what happens when it doesn't? So you're exactly right. Sometimes people have very important things. They want schools to do good things, but they establish a rule or an expectation and then don't provide supplemental funding to do it. So there is a little bit of tension sometimes between the legislative process generating really important social or public outcomes and the resources available to achieve those. So I would say as much as possible, it's helpful when the folks who want to see something done differently do that in such a manner that it comes with an estimated cost and estimated funding. Mm hmm. So as I mentioned, the state really sets that school finance formula. And so each time you vote for your local representatives, make sure they know how important the school finance formula is, and that we do need as much funding as we can possibly get. We don't want to go back to the budget stabilization factor, which is that more jargon and basically means money was taken from us that should have been given to us. So again, parents who are voting for their legislators can really influence the trajectory of school finance and thus the quality of programing in their schools by being informed about some of that state level dialog. And for those of you who may or may not know, I have found that school districts are often working very closely with some of our legislators, or at least paying attention to interests or things that they might be working towards putting into place that would have an impact on our schools. So where is it fair to say we try to stay ahead of it as much as possible or even a part of the collaborative process when the opportunity exists? Absolutely. We try to have good and consistent relationships with all of our elected officials, and that often involves really just sharing information. Again, being transparent, making sure that they understand what we're doing with what we have so that they can speak to that and advocate on our behalf. Very interesting. All the things that you might not know when it comes to budgetary impacts and how school districts plan. Are there times where there might be dissenting opinions and a budgetary process, and maybe not as a CFO, but as a school leader who is responsible for building consensus around a budget? Do you have any words of advice that you might share with our principal or school leaders out there who are in these situations all the time I do think dissenting opinions matter, and there's always something to be learned. And the more we listen to those opinions and not necessarily try to reshape them. I think the overall process is stronger because we can find some compromise positions and or sometimes that dissenting opinion is highlighting something a little further down the road that we need to consider. So I think it is as much as possible about just listening and taking it all in. Yeah. And I've found in my time that everyone has the best interests of our students in mind, and often the only solution they've come up with is one thing. But there are ways to see alternative solutions that could also address the same need. And people can come around So, Matt, I actually have a question for you. Love it. Bring it. What do you call a chicken who counts their eggs? Chicken who counts? 36. I don't know. A mathematician. That is so well done in Vienna. Par for the course. So a big thank you to you, Brenner, for giving us insight into the financial workings of public school districts and how budgeting impacts education. It's clear that managing school finances is both a complex and crucial task, and we've gained a deeper understanding of the efforts involved. Before we wrap things up today, are there any final thoughts from you that you want to make sure we get out to listeners? So we've been talking a lot about the budget process, the tools, the way we approach it. But the most important thing is what is the vision of the district? And so I want to give a shout out to our Superintendent Dalton, who has a clear vision and strategic plan and to our board, who has been very clear about their priorities. Budgeting ultimately is easy when you know what an organization wants to do. And so I'm very grateful for those visionary documents for how we're going to spend money That wraps up our conversation with Brenna Copeland. Thanks so much, Brianna. And stay tuned, everyone, for our next episode where we'll be exploring more topics that are shaping the future of education. we'll catch you next time on the Elevate Education podcast. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe, write us and share with others who might be interested. Do you have questions about this episode or a suggestion for a future podcast topic? Share with us by visiting the sharing form in the podcast description. This is a production of Jeffco Public Schools, Colorado.
My name is Matt Calero and welcome to Elevate Education. Welcome back, everyone. I'm your host, Matt Palermo. And today we have a very special guest who plays a crucial role in shaping the future of education in the district. We're thrilled to welcome Brant Copeland, Chief Financial Officer for Jeffco Public Schools. Brenner brings a wealth of knowledge, get it? A wealth of knowledge and experience to the table, overseeing the financial operations and budgetary decisions for one of Colorado's largest school districts. In this episode, Brenner will help us navigate the complexities of public school financing, sharing how school districts are funded, how budgets are developed, and the challenges and opportunities that come with managing educational finances. Brenna, it's fantastic to have you on the podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today. Why don't we just get started by having you introduce yourself a little bit? Tell us why you got into this role, what you're most excited about, so on and so forth. Awesome. Thank you so much, Matt. It's really a pleasure to be here. My background spans different parts of education and finance because I've worked in sort of everything from investment banking to district strategies for school improvement and many things in between. One thing I love, is the opportunity to engage more with our schools and look beyond numbers to student experiences. Just a quick, fun fact about me when I'm not poring over my Excel spreadsheets. I like to do woodworking and I'm about to finish a pretty groovy demo loan table for my living room. Oh, interesting. Now, hold on. I've never heard a CFO say, look beyond the numbers. Can you tell me a little bit more about that? I believe that budgets are really just a manifestation of a plan. And while there are numbers on a page, it really is a story. It's a story about what are we doing for students, where and how. And that's what gets me excited. That's what I try and highlight for the board on a year over year basis is what's really changing. What are we doing different and how will that look for our students here in Jeffco? Interesting is something that I think our listeners might like to know more about is how public school districts are funded. So could you maybe start with just giving us a little bit of an overview of what that looks like? Absolutely. So school districts are publicly funded from a mix of property taxes at the local level and also income and sales taxes at the state level. So we are a government entity providing a public good and therefore we're basically tax supported. About 75% of our funding is determined by a formula set by our state legislature and approved by the governor. Of course, this formula establishes a per student funding level that is then multiplied by our count of students. While the formula itself is really complicated. It is stable and predictable, which is very helpful when our district is trying to hire and retain great teachers and staff. About 16% of our funding comes from additional voter approved property taxes, meaning the voters have said, we will give you additional money above and beyond sort of what we have to those support very important programs in Jeffco and they are truly supplemental. So the money we get through that formula that I mentioned, the rest of funding comes from state or federal grants. Also some special revenues, things like our school lunch program and then some miscellaneous things like school fees and my favorite investment earnings. That's pretty much the snapshot. Okay. I got to ask, what are investment earnings? This is where our money makes money and doesn't do anything. And I will say the inflation we've all had to face prices in the grocery store has been not so great. The district has been earning some interest on our deposits, which has provided some one time funds towards really important projects. Interesting. Now, something else you talked about is supplemental funding or what I understand to be additional funds that taxpayers might approve. Would that be something like a mill levy or a bond or something that shows up during an election season? Absolutely. So there's really two types of metal levees that have to do with the school district, maybe three. The first one is. What we call base mill levees. And that's a mill levee, by the way, is just a rate. It's a very fancy word for a rate and a tax increment rate. And so there's a base rate that everyone has to pay. What we sometimes referred to as overrides is that no levee override, additional amount. I just spoke to and though it's jargony, it really just means additional money. And the third type would be funds very specific to borrowing. So if the district borrows or taxpayers have to approve that and they may pass something called a bond. And that bond comes with a separate mill levy. So a very dedicated mill levy or a rate of taxation that then goes towards paying off the debt. Wow. I never knew that. So let me jump in to kind of this topic of budgeting. How does Jeffco Public Schools approach budgeting and financial planning, and what are some of the key priorities when creating a school district budget? Yeah. Our number one priority is always our people. Salaries and benefits expense makes up about 87% of what we spend in Jeffco. You know, not my salary alone, to be clear. So for all the fancy jargon, the district's budget boils down to a very simple equation. How many people will we employ and how much do we pay them? Which actually reminds me of one of my favorite jokes. Matt, let's hear it. How much does a pirate pay for corn? I don't know, Verna. How much does the pirate pay? A buccaneer. So when we do get around to our budgeting process, obviously one unique thing is that a school district is really operating out of so many different sites, a.k.a. our schools. And each school runs a little bit like a mini business that is part of a larger franchise. Our budgeting process reflects the fact that school leadership teams have the best line of sight into what needs to happen in their building. So we try to give schools as much decision making as possible over how their budgets are deployed. Sabrina, you mentioned that 87%, I think somewhere around that range is invested in our people out in our schools. Could you get super granular, kind of elaborate on that a little bit more? What does that mean? So that means that each year we produce approximately 14,000 W-2 reports, which is your annual earnings statement. So in one way, shape or form, 14,000 humans do something for our students here in Jeffco. Now, about 2000 of those folks are generally our guest teachers, really, really important folks who stand down when we have teacher absences. We love and appreciate our guest teachers, but they make up a big chunk. We also have quite a few coaches who may not be an educator full time, but they're supporting our students in these important activities. When you take that 14,000 down to about 9000, that's how many full time folks we have in the district within the 9000. About 5000 are licensed teachers, meaning that in the state of Colorado they can perform a teaching function in their specific discipline. So that is the biggest chunk, although obviously between the 9000 and the 5000, you have about 4000, and that covers everything else we do. Student success has some folks who are not licensed educators, for example, who are providing supports in schools, but all of our operations. So all of our food and nutrition services are bus drivers, our mechanics, our maintenance folks, the folks who clear the snow when we get those snowstorms. All of them are also represented in that 4000 number. So when it's all said and done, you have you know, we have 130 ish principals in the district. Those would be school leaders. And that sort of balloons back up to the big number of the 14,000. Regarding school budgets, when money is allocated in support of the school. Are there parameters that principals or school leaders have to adhere to when spending their money? And what are some of those things that someone who isn't responsible for managing a school budget might not know about? Yep. So your question really highlights one of the unique things that Jeffco does with our resource allocation. So a traditional approach in the past would allocate to a school. Effectively a position as opposed to dollars. And this is sort of it's sometimes referred to as a staffing allocation approach. Instead, we give schools dollars based on enrollment, and those dollars are adjusted as well to reflect some unique needs of students. The school leader then takes those dollars and makes decisions about what positions to fund or not fund. And this, in effect, really localizes the decision making to the school site and creates some flexibility. So school leaders actually have quite a bit of decision making. And to your point parameters. So what are the parameters? Those are guidelines that we provide sometimes in the form of we've agreed to a standard or expectation with one of our bargaining units who has said it's really important to provide this type of person in this type of school. And therefore, we try and do that on a minimum basis. Other times it's just best practice, you know, how many teachers do you need per a set of students in a classroom, etc.? So there are guidelines we publish, but there is flexibility at the school level. Excellent. And do schools also have other types of costs that are just associated with, say, running a school building like operational cost? How is that managed? And is that something separate from a school budget that the district takes care of, or is that a part of the principal's role to manage all of that? Well, the good news is our mini businesses don't actually have to manage every aspect of, for example, our custodial services or grounds maintenance or facility maintenance. Those are all pretty obvious and intuitive things that we manage out of a department. Right. There's a person with great expertize for how to do that particular service and therefore their employees do that. And school leaders don't have to think about it. A lesson to it of sort of allocation or service provided in our schools is actually within student success. As I know you know, we have specialized professionals doing a number of different important roles in schools, supporting students directly that are not part of the school budget. Okay. Now getting to the good stuff. So you kind of gave me an understanding of the different types of funding sources that come in to a school district and how we make decisions in terms of allocating funds out to schools. Can you maybe share some examples of how budget has directly impacted schools within Jeffco? Absolutely. So students may not always be aware of the ways that their school budget impacts their day to day, but it definitely does. So, for example, a school leader could decide to invest some of their budget allocation into additional foreign language courses or instructors, because that's something that's important for their school community. Courses like computer programing or other electives really are offered in different places of the district based on what school communities in those different areas of the district want Likewise, school leaders determine how many staff to hire. So back to this question of how many students are in a classroom, it has to do with how many teachers we hire. And so really a student who's sitting in a room with fewer students knows that their principal has prioritized hiring teachers. A student who's in a larger classroom may recognize, therefore, that their principal has prioritized offering additional electives or specialty courses with some of their budget. Interesting. What trends or changes are you seeing in the financial resources for public school districts, if any at all? So the good news is that here in Jefferson County, we have a strong economy and a residential population that is growing slightly each year. This means that our schools are part of an overall economic picture that is strong, and this helps with state and local tax collections. That said, though, the total population is increasing, the number of school age children in Jefferson County has been declining for a decade. We currently serve about 12% fewer students than we did eight years ago. This is in spite of new residential development that many folks are aware of in certain parts of Jeffco. This overall trend means that we are receiving less money on an inflation adjusted basis than we were before because that student count has gone down. The good news is it takes fewer people to serve fewer students. So really the task is to make sure we adjust wherever necessary to maintain our vibrant programing in schools. So going back to what you said earlier, what I think I understood is that a lot of school funding is dependent on the total student enrollment of a school district. And when you have less enrollment, that often results in less funding, and therefore you have to right size budgets. So as a district leader, when you being chief financial officer, what might be some ways or some advice that you might have for school leaders out there faced with these difficult budgetary decisions? Where do you start? So we're going to work together as a community to really make sure that each aspect of our budget, each area where we spend money, aligns to the priorities we hold as a school community. It really is an overall pool of resources that we share. One of the things I like to point out sometimes is there's no difference between schools and the district. The district includes our schools and they exist as a part of the district. So when we spend in different places of our budget, which may seem like spending at the district level versus at the school level, it's really all the same dollar. So we will need to come together as a community and say, are the ways that we're spending collectively our most important priorities. And if not, how can we adjust? Those are really difficult decisions. You know, sometimes when I'm looking at my budget, I'm really I've really started to shift my thinking. And you've supported me in this. And what kind of outcomes are we getting for kids given this financial investment? And I know that's a very business way to think about finances, but the reality is, is we're here to serve kids and improve outcomes for kids. So really looking at our budgets to think about what kind of outcomes we're getting as a result of those investments is important. Something that I've been wondering about that I think our listeners might like to know more about is what's one thing about managing school district finances that might surprise people outside of the field? So I go back to my point that I think it's actually simple. It really though we have a 1.3 billion annual spend. It really comes down to how many people do we need to do what we do for students and community and how much do we pay them? And though we buy supplies and materials and we pay for other things, it really is that fundamental question that everyone sort of understands. We provide a service delivered by humans, and so people are everything about our budget. Speaking of budget, tell me who's responsible for approving the budget. The Board of Education actually has the sole right and responsibility to approve the budget. Now they delegate to the superintendent the ability to make changes within a set appropriations. So all year long we can operate and adjust a little where need be. But the board ultimately has to say go forth and spend. Wow. You know, when I think about my own budget, I tend to think of it through, like checking savings and credit. Now, does the district have what I would refer to as like a savings account, like a rainy day fund? I know that's maybe not the exact way we would describe it, but that's what I think about personally with my own money. How does the district think about savings? Is that even a thing? It's definitely a thing. First and foremost, I'm going to put in a plug for Tabor, since obviously the district appreciates being TABOR compliant. We do maintain a 3% mandatory reserve and the state limits the conditions through which we can access that reserve. So and the limits are so severe that I don't actually know of a case where a school district has used their TABOR reserve, but it always exists. On top of that, the board says we should have at least 4% in what's called unassigned reserves. So this would be the part of your savings account or your piggy bank that you don't actually know what you're going to do with it yet, like the emergency fund, so to speak. Exactly. But there's certain things in our piggy bank that we do know what we're going to do with them. And those are called assigned reserves. And that just means they have a specific purpose, either this year or next year. So one example is our schools who budget each year may or may not spend their entire budget. And like you or I, if we don't spend our entire budget, there's something left over. That leftover ultimately shows up as a district reserve. But we say to the schools, Hey, you can tap into this next year if you need it, and that becomes an assigned reserve of the district. So it's definitely part of our reserves, but it's very much tied specifically to that school location. So would a school district consider using a reserve in a situation where maybe something that, you know, maybe something comes up that you hadn't budgeted for that you need money for? So like in my life, for example, I just went and had some car repairs made on my car and those were completely unexpected. So I actually had to transfer money from my savings over to my checking account to pay for that bill. Are there situations like that where school or a department or even the district as a whole has to make some of those kind of budgetary decisions and adjustments as the year progresses? Yeah, so typically we try not to dip into reserves in Shroyer, but if we are going to use our savings, we try to tell the board in advance and ask for their permission and explain how is this thing? We're going to pay for it. Okay, car repairs, how is that going to contribute to the overall quality and how do we make sure it happens once, not every year? And so last year on a couple of different occasions, we talked to the board about needing to rebuild Fletcher Miller. And the board very specifically said, hey, we have some reserves available. This is a one time use. We want to deploy a certain amount of our reserves towards building this building, which is not sort of you don't have to pay for it every year. You pay for it once. So that's an example. That's a great example. How do you as a CFO, advisor, board or advisor or superintendent around things like community engagement? I heard you mentioned earlier that there's a community aspect to budgeting and we're ultimately in service to the kids and our community and of course, the community as taxpayers So what does that look like from your perspective? So I want to put in a plug for our financial transparency website, though it's required by law. I actually think it's really informative and helpful and I just double checked. If you type in to Google Jeffco Public Schools, financial transparency, it is the top result in Google. So you can click right through to it. Now that website has each budget we adopt every year. And I do want to mention there's more details about how we spend our money in each of those budget documents The budget documents are probably 80 ish pages long and it's a nice PDF. There's some charts, there's some data about the total number of people we employ in different positions. For those folks who want to explore a little more deeply. But engaging with the public, in my opinion, is really all about transparency. And so whenever we present to anyone, whether it's the board parents, the District Accountability Committee. A financial advisory committee, which is a separate committee of our community members who volunteer their time and meet with myself. My staff go over our finances in great detail whenever we present to them. Our goal is be as clear and succinct as possible because that enables folks to engage in the course stuff. And the course stuff is really. Who are we employing? What are they doing for our kids? And are those structures that we would also leverage as school leaders? So like, is that where like the parent advisory committee fits into the role of a school? And is that something that a principal would engage their school staff in at a staff meeting? Or how does that look for a principal to engage their community around their budget? Yeah. So the best way for a parent to engage who really wants to influence how we spend money is to join their School Accountability Committee. We sometimes refer to it as the sack, which I always think of as the lunch sac. But actually it's the group of parents who help the principal make the budget each year. And they actually have quite a bit of influence because they're a sounding board for the principal. One school I know of, one of our middle schools every year, goes to her SAC and says, Do we still want to run seven periods a day instead of six? Because it changes the way we staff and resource our building and the parents say Yay or nay. He literally holds a vote with his school accountability committee and that drives his plan for the coming year. And so it's a wonderful way at the local level or at the school level to have input and how the money is spent. this raises another interest of mine, and that is how does legislation impact the school district budget? For example, if there's a new House bill that's passed into law that requires a school district to do something, sometimes I understand that might come with funding and sometimes it doesn't. So what happens when it doesn't? So you're exactly right. Sometimes people have very important things. They want schools to do good things, but they establish a rule or an expectation and then don't provide supplemental funding to do it. So there is a little bit of tension sometimes between the legislative process generating really important social or public outcomes and the resources available to achieve those. So I would say as much as possible, it's helpful when the folks who want to see something done differently do that in such a manner that it comes with an estimated cost and estimated funding. Mm hmm. So as I mentioned, the state really sets that school finance formula. And so each time you vote for your local representatives, make sure they know how important the school finance formula is, and that we do need as much funding as we can possibly get. We don't want to go back to the budget stabilization factor, which is that more jargon and basically means money was taken from us that should have been given to us. So again, parents who are voting for their legislators can really influence the trajectory of school finance and thus the quality of programing in their schools by being informed about some of that state level dialog. And for those of you who may or may not know, I have found that school districts are often working very closely with some of our legislators, or at least paying attention to interests or things that they might be working towards putting into place that would have an impact on our schools. So where is it fair to say we try to stay ahead of it as much as possible or even a part of the collaborative process when the opportunity exists? Absolutely. We try to have good and consistent relationships with all of our elected officials, and that often involves really just sharing information. Again, being transparent, making sure that they understand what we're doing with what we have so that they can speak to that and advocate on our behalf. Very interesting. All the things that you might not know when it comes to budgetary impacts and how school districts plan. Are there times where there might be dissenting opinions and a budgetary process, and maybe not as a CFO, but as a school leader who is responsible for building consensus around a budget? Do you have any words of advice that you might share with our principal or school leaders out there who are in these situations all the time I do think dissenting opinions matter, and there's always something to be learned. And the more we listen to those opinions and not necessarily try to reshape them. I think the overall process is stronger because we can find some compromise positions and or sometimes that dissenting opinion is highlighting something a little further down the road that we need to consider. So I think it is as much as possible about just listening and taking it all in. Yeah. And I've found in my time that everyone has the best interests of our students in mind, and often the only solution they've come up with is one thing. But there are ways to see alternative solutions that could also address the same need. And people can come around So, Matt, I actually have a question for you. Love it. Bring it. What do you call a chicken who counts their eggs? Chicken who counts? 36. I don't know. A mathematician. That is so well done in Vienna. Par for the course. So a big thank you to you, Brenner, for giving us insight into the financial workings of public school districts and how budgeting impacts education. It's clear that managing school finances is both a complex and crucial task, and we've gained a deeper understanding of the efforts involved. Before we wrap things up today, are there any final thoughts from you that you want to make sure we get out to listeners? So we've been talking a lot about the budget process, the tools, the way we approach it. But the most important thing is what is the vision of the district? And so I want to give a shout out to our Superintendent Dalton, who has a clear vision and strategic plan and to our board, who has been very clear about their priorities. Budgeting ultimately is easy when you know what an organization wants to do. And so I'm very grateful for those visionary documents for how we're going to spend money That wraps up our conversation with Brenna Copeland. Thanks so much, Brianna. And stay tuned, everyone, for our next episode where we'll be exploring more topics that are shaping the future of education. we'll catch you next time on the Elevate Education podcast. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to subscribe, write us and share with others who might be interested. Do you have questions about this episode or a suggestion for a future podcast topic? Share with us by visiting the sharing form in the podcast description. This is a production of Jeffco Public Schools, Colorado.
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