Lincoln-Way 210 Saw 'Financial Watch List' Coming

Lincoln-Way High School District 210 is highly regarded academically and on the athletic fields in the State of Illinois. That comes from the hard work of the students.

It is the Administration and Board of Education that have tarnished D-210’s stellar reputation: The District has not achieved a positive financial rating from the Illinois State Board of Education in the past 12 years.

Frankfort resident and Lincoln-Way parent, Jay Curatolo, pointed out in his December 2015 speech to the Board of Education that Lincoln-Way has been under “review” and “early warning” designation for more than a decade – and “financial watch” was only a matter of time.

Curatolo said that the Board has repeatedly blamed the state for funding issues, but it is the Board’s own financial mismanagement that landed the District in the lower 4% of school districts in the entire state. Only 38 schools out of 860 schools in the State of Illinois made the “financial watch” list, and all 860 of those schools have had the same level of support from the state.

Full Text Here:

"Every year, the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) assigns one of four designations to every one of the 860 school districts in our state.

Highest Level for Schools that are financially secure – Recognition

Next Highest – Review

Next – Early Warning

Bottom – Watch List

We all know where we landed this year, on the fateful Watch List. We hold that designation with only 38 school districts out of 860. We are in the bottom 4% of the districts in our state.

On the other hand, 553 school districts are rated at the top level of the designations with “Recognition.” This is 64% of the districts in our state. If we add in the 199 districts in the next highest level, 87% of the districts are within the top two ratings categories.

Shocking, isn’t it? While the state has its problems, 87% of the school districts in our state are operating without major issues, even though they are subject to the very same state funding issues that we are.

And here’s one more…in the last 12 years, Lincoln-Way School District 210 has NEVER attained that “Recognition” rating. In the last 12 years, we have had 6 “review” ratings and 5 “early warning” ratings. Now we have added “Watch List” to our trophy case.

Last summer, you sat here blaming the state for our predicament. I’m sorry, but I’m not buying that. You told us to go visit the lawmakers in Springfield and complain to them for our situation. What a shill! We now know that the state provides only 12% of our annual budget. The state is not the root cause of our situation. The truth is that instead admitting to our problems years ago when this would have been so much easier to fix, you tried to divert our attention away from what you’ve done over the past several years and blame it on someone else.

You ran us into the ground. You chose to use those reserves and now you are exposed. It’s a lot like walking in on your kid with his hand in the cookie jar.

It’s time to stop the bleeding. It’s time to live within our means. It’s time to curb this spendthrift culture.

We don’t need to add another welding lab to our district. We can’t afford it. Find another solution.

We don’t need to buy the faculty and staff special t-shirts to wear one time on the first day of school. What message does that send to the kids who just learned their school will close?

I attended the freshman study skills seminar for finals and received a 16-page packet of information. Was that necessary? A lot of it was duplicated and handed out again in class. The stack of unused packets on the table when I left that night had to equate to at least a full case of paper printed, collated and stapled. What a waste of paper, toner and manpower.

In December, I received four letters in the mail from 210 on the very same day. All were the exact same letter explaining the bus service changes during finals. Two were addressed to each of my two sons. First of all, my sons do not ride the bus, but this District has never considered asking families whether or not they want or need bus service. This district just provides it regardless. How wasteful is that? Transportation is a huge drain to our bottom line!

But that’s not all…why are you mailing these out? The cost is $.48 per letter! Couldn’t this have been an email? An email costs nothing.

Third, why did you duplicate it? I checked around, and found I wasn’t alone. Households around the district received multiple letters. Didn’t anyone realize you used twice as many envelopes as you should have?

I heard the swim teams were at Andrew for a meet. Each school was limited to 10 entrants, yet each of our schools sent those 10 entrants to Andrew in a full size bus.

I don’t collect the sizeable salaries our administrators do. I won’t ever collect a big pension, but in just 6 months, I’ve learned a lot about running a school, and I challenge you to start making changes. Start looking ahead and planning. Find ways to cut costs and stop others from being wasteful. Change the way your staff thinks.

WE HAVE TO START THINKING LIKE A DISTRICT IN FINANCIAL DISTRESS, BECAUSE WE ARE!"