The Henry County Board of Education voted at its May 13 regular meeting to approve a tentative budget for the 2019-2020 school year, with the final budget scheduled for adoption in June.
General fund revenue under the new budget is pegged at $407,152,238. Among the highlights listed by district staff during the presentation are some $22 million in school-based and district-based personnel investments. Also noted was that the budget is balanced with a commitment to maintaining reserves, with school levels for funding maintained at $60 per student and continued transportation funding for middle and high school athletic teams, including bands, for Georgia High School Association-sanctioned events.
Tax digest projections and state funding totals are about $5 million higher than believed to be in earlier reports, according to district staff.
Budget expenditures projected at $404,634,349 are for an expected enrollment of 43,309 students at an average of $9,343 per student. The report included FY2018 statistics that showed Henry County with the sixth-highest expenditures per student among the ten largest school districts in Georgia, with the lowest central office expenditures per student of any in the top ten.
The final budget will be considered for adoption at the June 10 regular board meeting.
In other business, the board received a draft of a new code of conduct and it is now available for public review. Operating with the goal of providing what officials called a “comprehensive, progressive, and supportive” code, the proposal lays out guidelines for progressive discipline on four levels depending upon the severity of the offense, with discipline ranging from verbal warnings to out-of-school suspension to disciplinary hearings that could result in expulsion. The final document with all appropriate revisions, updates or modifications will be submitted for approval during the board’s June 10 meeting. Information was presented on the district’s “Never Stop Learning” summer learning campaign. It includes “district-developed online learning opportunities that point students toward summer activities to keep the learning going over the summer months,” according to a district staff report. As a part of this, students in grades 3-11 will be encouraged to keep their Chromebooks over the summer months to give them access to these resources.
