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Dr. Kevin O’Mara
Argo Comm 217
Cook South Region
“I feel that our biggest challenge
remains the funding uncertainty surrounding the state's
support for teaching and learning. The proration was kept
constant, but is still woefully inadequate to meet the needs
of our schoolchildren. The looming pension ‘fix’ that will
almost certainly demand that school districts either wholly or
partially fund the normal costs going forward will only serve
to exacerbate the situation. I just don't see it getting better
in either the short or long term.
I will continue to be fiscally conservative, budgeting for less
than I hope for on the revenue side and working with our
staff and Board of Education to minimize negative effects on
our kids.”
“The biggest challenge is to continue to
implement and maintain, with integrity,
mandated as well as local initiatives and
services designed to promote student
achievement in a climate of uncertain financial
stability. These include but are not limited to: Common Core State Standards,
PARCC, RTI, Early Childhood, School Safety, Continuous Staff Professional
Development, Transportation, PERA Requirements and Personnel.
Continue the cautious, thoughtful, and conservative allocation of human and fiscal resources. Working
individually and in collaboration with IASA, emphasize to the ISBE and Legislature the critical
importance of a reliable and sufficient revenue source to adequately operate and maintain these
programs. “
Cliff McClure
Paxton-Buckley-Loda CU 10
Corn Belt Region
Victor White, III
Prairieview-Ogden
CCSD 197
Illini Region
“In a word: finance. We did RIFs and
most likely will have to do it
again. Also we are putting an
education referendum for vote in
March 2014. Along with the new
teacher evaluation, lunch rules, loss
of transportation funds, the list can go
on and on.”
“Balancing budgets while maintaining top tier
education excellence with potentially drastic
increases in costs due to the state legislature’s
attempts to transfer their responsibilities onto local
school districts and, thus local taxpayers. These
“moving targets” expenses and “prorations” (cuts) in promised anticipated revenue
are causing us to increase class sizes and decrease offerings without a firm grasp
on what we are actually going to need in revenues to support our program
expenses.
We are making minor cuts in many areas in hopes of staving off the seemingly inevitable total
programming cuts.”
Dr. Steve Webb
Goreville Comm Unit 1
Shawnee Region
