Updated: School board labors over cuts to services, programs to fill $50M budget gap

The Board of Education reviewed its options Wednesday for closing a $50 million budget gap and chose to increase class sizes, but emotional appeals from students, parents and educators saved fourth grade instrumental music from the chopping block, for now.

Expenditures in the proposed fiscal year 2025 operating budget total $988.2 million, with revenue at $938.2 million, leaving a gap of roughly $50 million.

In public documents, the FCPS staff suggested cuts and increases in revenue that reduce that gap by $22.4 million.

During the board meeting at the central office Wednesday, FCPS Associate Superintendent of Fiscal Services Heather Clabaugh said discussions with employee unions yielded an additional $16.5 million cut from the salary resource pool.

It was unclear Wednesday how the salary pool reduction would affect individual employees. The board unanimously voted to accept that change into the proposed budget.

The FCPS staff proposed changing the teacher-student ratio to reduce expenses by $6.9 million and cut the equivalent of 83.4 full-time positions. The board voted unanimously to add that change to the proposed budget.

Other proposed cuts include eliminating instrumental music education for fourth graders around the county. But after an emotional appeal by Monocacy Elementary School teacher Samantha Vaughn-Barrett, who said music education saved her life, the board unanimously voted to keep the program.

“I was not planning for life past 18,” she told the board. “The only reason I am standing here today, not as a staff member, not as an advocate, but as a human being who is alive, is because that was the only thing driving me forward.”

Outside the central office, Brunswick Middle School student William Junod signaled for cars on South East Street to honk as he held a poster with a drawing of a stringed instrument and a heart. Nearby, Urbana Middle School Band Director Doug Conrad held his own sign, “Save 4th Grade Band and Orchestra.”

“The emotional impact of these changes touches everyone in the organization,” FCPS Superintendent Cheryl Dyson said, speaking broadly about the proposed changes. During the board meeting, she called for unity and strength in the community.

“We can value each and every program, and know that at the same time, those things we value and we hold dear we might have to let go, at least this season,” Dyson said.

Jenncyn Eyler, an 11th grade student at Gov. Thomas Johnson High School, participates in the school’s Academy of Fine Arts and addressed the council during public comment Wednesday.

“As much as I love sports, I had to quit sports because I got diagnosed with some bad physical conditions and I could not continue. I leaned on my art, I leaned on my music, which I started in fourth grade,” she said. “We have these cuts, which I understand why certain things need to happen, but I question why it’s the art community that it happens to, over and over and over again.”

Eliminating the fourth grade instrumental music program would have saved the school system about $582,000 in fiscal year 2025, according to the FCPS staff.

Many of the students, parents and educators who spoke during the meeting’s public comment period asked the board not to cut the program. Their messages struck a chord with board member David Bass.

“Coming into tonight, I did not understand the power that starting music at fourth grade has on students around the county,” he said at the meeting.

Board of Education Vice President Rae Gallagher said her oldest daughter is in fifth grade and participated in the fourth grade instrumental music program at her school.

“Seeing her evolution in that program over the past year has been astounding,” Gallagher said at the meeting.

The board unanimously voted to keep the fourth grade program, but didn’t settle on where to cut funding in order to pay for it.

“Should the money not be found, we will revisit,” Board of Education President Karen Yoho said at the meeting.

Scaling back remote virtual classes

The board’s unanimous vote to keep the music program also sacrificed the Remote Virtual Program for third through eighth graders.

The program, which started as a response to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, benefits students with health, behavioral or other concerns with conventional classroom learning. FCPS stopped accepting first and second graders to the program as a cost-saving measure for fiscal year 2024.

Amy Boehman-Pollitt, president of Emmitsburg’s Board of Commissioners, wrote to the Board of Education “as a concerned parent of a neurodiverse child,” asking the members to reconsider cutting the program.

“The Remote Virtual Program services many children with diverse needs and to see this program dissipate would be unjust and detrimental to their student population since they would be forced back into an in-person environment that failed them,” she wrote.

At the elementary school level, there are 12 students with access to the program who receive Special Education services or have accommodations under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. In grades 6 through 8, there are 57 such students with access to the program, according to FCPS Associate Superintendent of Special Education & Student Services Jennifer Bingman, who spoke at Wednesday's meeting.

Rising eighth graders would have access to the high school virtual learning program.

The FCPS staff has been meeting with parents and guardians of potentially affected students to ensure their needs are met in the absence of the remote option, Bingman said.

By eliminating the Remote Virtual Program for elementary and middle schoolers, the school system would save about $2.7 million and the equivalent of about 24 full-time positions.

Increasing athletics fees

FCPS staff proposed increasing the fee a student athlete would pay for a single season of a single sport from $95 to $175 to increase revenue. Fee waivers would still be available for students who can't afford the cost, according to the proposed budget.

“I don’t like increasing our sports fees,” said Dean Rose, whose son was a student athlete in 2010, when the fee was $55.

Rose proposed reducing the proposed fee from $175 to $135, which board members Jason Johnson, Nancy Allen, Yoho and Rose voted for. Board members Sue Johnson, Gallagher and Bass voted against the motion, which passed.

Rose later floated the idea of increasing the fee to $195 or $200 to make up for the cost of the fourth grade music program. Rose and Sue Johnson opted to have FCPS staff recalculate the potential revenue from an increased fee and revisit the idea at the board’s next meeting.

Students and parents involved with marching band programs at their schools weighed in during the discussion to say their overall expenses to participate in their music program were hundreds of dollars higher than the current $95 athletics fee.

“We can’t, unfortunately, fix the band fee tonight,” Rose said. “I 100% understand your frustrations and 100% would support advocacy on your behalf to reduce the costs of band, theater, everything our students enjoy doing.”

The board plans to continue discussing the fiscal year 2025 operating budget at a May 29 meeting, with final approval scheduled for June 26. FCPS is required by law to submit a balanced budget to the state by June 30.

Girls flag football

The document outlining proposed budget reductions included $24,370 of cuts to girls flag football, which had its inaugural season last fall. Clabaugh said the program is funded for three years through a grant from the Baltimore Ravens. She emphasized to board members that the program is not being considered for elimination.

She said the way the grant is structured, it provides less money each of the second and third years, respectively. FCPS is now taking Ravens grant money from a future year and using it to cover FCPS' share for next year.

Clabaugh warned the board that they would probably see a funding request in the FY2026 budget "because there's only so many times you can go to the well."