Split board discards assist. principal posts
Two administrative positions removed from 2007-08 school budget
BY VINCENT TODARO
Staff Writer

EAST BRUNSWICK - The Board of Education has decided against keeping two new assistant principal positions in the 2007-08 school budget.

At its March 22 meeting, the board took a 5-3 consensus vote to take the two positions out of the budget. Despite the urging of Superintendent of Schools Jo Ann Magistro to support the positions, the board majority felt the district could live without them. With salaries and benefits, the positions have a combined cost of approximately $200,000.

The omission will have little impact on the tax increase included in the proposed $129.6 million school budget, which is scheduled to be adopted by the board tonight following a public hearing. The tentative budget includes an increase of more than 36 cents per $100 of assessed valuation, or $360 per year for the owner of property assessed at $100,000.

The cost of the two positions amounts to less than 1 cent on the tax rate.

Magistro said the assistant principals were proposed for the newly expanded Lawrence Brook and Central elementary schools, but their services would also be used at the Warnsdorfer and Chittick elementary schools.

The positions would not count in the state-imposed spending cap because Central and Lawrence Brook have undergone new construction.

Magistro clarified any misconception that the district employs too many administrators, saying the number is down significantly from 1987, when there were about 6,700 students and 54 administrators; now there are more than 9,100 pupils and only 43 administrators.

Magistro noted that the community is changing, the administrative staff is spread thin, and there is a strong need for the roles performed by assistant principals.

Board member Stacy Bravman said that although the principals would not count against the spending cap this time, they would next year when the board prepares its budget.

She said she is not convinced that the two positions are needed any more than other items that the board has chosen not to fund because they cannot be afforded.

Bravman asked if lead teachers, as they are called, would be helpful in filling some of the roles planned for the assistant principals. Magistro said a lead teacher can give a school principal some assistance, but is very limited due to the fact that they also have classes to tend to.

The assistant principals would work primarily at Lawrence Brook and Central, Magistro said, telling board members that some schools need them much more than others.

"It's better than nobody having it," she said.

The assistant principals are not as necessary at the Frost and Bowne-Munro elementary schools because of the smaller student populations there, she said.

Board Vice President Todd Simmens said regular principals are more fundamental to the schools they work in.

"The principal has the character and personality of the building," he said. On the other hand, assistant principals are more in the realm of "paper pushers."

Board President Holly Howard said they are not there solely for paperwork, however, because they have a role in discipline, evaluation and other areas. If the district were to hire two and split them up among four schools, she said, perhaps next year, two more can be hired and split up.

Board member Dr. Susan Karp noted that the district could not afford to include all the elementary schools in the 2005 building referendum, but still went out for a limited construction project and won the approval of voters.

In an informal vote on the assistant principal matter, board members Howard, Karp and William McCann voted to keep them in the budget, while Bravman, Simmens, Scott Luxenberg, Meredith Shaw and Vicki Becker voted to remove the items.