Hamilton County School District, Florida

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Hamilton County School District is a school district in Florida. The school system has a total attendance of 1,757 students project for the 2009-2010 school year. The Florida Department of Education provides a list of past, current, and future school enrollment totals for each district.

[edit] Website evaluation

Main article: Evaluation of Florida school district websites

[edit] The good

  • School board members are listed with contact information. Meeting dates and recent minutes are posted.[1]
  • Student progression plan is posted.[2]
  • Administrative officials are listed with contact information.[3]

[edit] The bad

  • Most features of the site are not accessible using Firefox, site has no search function.
  • Does not provide information on meeting agendas, taxes, budget, contracts, audits, making public records requests, and background checks.
Working for accountable government now


[edit] School board

The school board controls school property, establishes, organizes, and operates the schools of the district, including: establishing schools, adopting enrollment plans, providing for school elimination and consolidation, cooperating with school boards of adjoining districts in maintaining schools, maintaining the school year schedule and other more specific duties as outlined in the Florida statute. It operates, controls and supervises the district's public schools as well as determines the rate of school district taxes, with the option of two or more school districts operating and financing educational programs together.[4]

In addition to its current members, Hamilton County's school board has a superintendent who retains executive oversight and administrative duties over the board. The current superintendent is Martha W. Butler.

Below are the school board members for 2009-2010:[5]

Member District Term Term expires
Damon Deas District 1 1st 2010
Gary Godwin District 2 1st 2012
Jeanie Daniels District 3 1st 2012
Joyce Shaw District 4 1st 2010
Don Fenneman District 5 2nd 2010

Martha Butler is the Superintendent of the district and James E. Willingham, Jr. is the School Board Attorney.

[edit] Teacher contracts

In the spring of 2008, the School Board approved and enacted a 4.5% increase on teacher salaries for those holding Bachelor's degrees, augmenting the salary range to between $32,829 and $49,620 a year.[6]

[edit] School Budget

As of the 2008-2009 academic year, the school district has $18,451,000 for their total revenue. The financial breakdown was as follows:[7]

  • General instruction and training: $8,490,000
  • Teacher salaries: $5,623,000
  • Pupils: $1,051,000
  • Total support services: $6,613,000

In addition, the Hamilton County School District is slated to receive $527,783 in Title I Grant allocations under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan.[8]

Unfortunately no budgetary information could be found on the school district's website, any of the actual school's websites or in recent news articles, which contributes to the lack of detailed financial accounts.

[edit] Academic Performance

Below is a chart of the school's grade based on the student's performance of the statewide test called the FCAT.[9]

School Level Grade: 2007-08 Grade: 2008-09
Hamilton County High School High D F
Central Hamilton Elementary School Elementary D F
North Hamilton Elementary School Elementary B B
South Hamilton Elementary School Elementary C C

Reacting to the district's poor performance in the 2008-2009 academic year, Superintendent Martha W. Butler released a statement on the district's website expressing her overall disappointment with the results, particularly with Central Hamilton's and Hamilton High School's failing grades. She did, however, acknowledge that "We were pleased to see that North and South Hamilton retained the same grades as last year, and hope to see these also improve in the next grading period." The two school's grades were B and C, respectively. Butler also added that steps were being taken to ensure improvement in the upcoming academic school year, mentioning professional development programs such as the Florida Reading Initiative (FRI), Students Understanding Math and Science (SUMS), and the High Schools That Work (HSTW) Program; as well as a new classroom management program, Positive Behavior Support (PBS), "which will define and set the expectations outlined by the classroom teachers and school leaders."[10]

In July of 2009, Superintendent Martha W. Butler and Assistant Superintendent Max Mitchell held meetings with parents of students to "discuss ways parents can make better choices with regard to their child’s academic needs." The meetings are a reaction to the school districts four schools receiving an F in the state grading system.[11]

[edit] Unions

Hamilton County is part of the statewide union Florida Education Association, which has as one of its main advantages a swift track to tenure. Under agreements between the union and state, public school teachers receive tenure after only three years of teaching, after which they become almost impossible to fire. The firing rate for tenured or post-probationary teachers was only .03%, expanding to 2.64% when looking at probationary teachers. At the same time, the national firing rate for private school teachers is 9.8%. The budges of the FEA in 2008 was as follows[12]:

  • Total Revenue: $ 20,133,842
  • Total Expenses: $ 19,978,236
  • Total Assets: $ 9,177,174

[edit] Lobbying

Main article: Florida taxpayer-funded lobbying

The school district pays membership dues to the Florida School Boards Association, a taxpayer-funded lobbying association.[13]

[edit] School Choice

Despite the fact that the state of Florida recorded 389 charter school statewide at the end of the 2008-2009 year, there are no charter school opportunities in Hamilton county specifically.[14] The same applies for the county's participation in voucher programs, despite the fact that two specific voucher programs (the McKay Scholarship for children with disabilities, and a corporate tuition tax credit which largely works the same as a voucher) cost the state $200 million annually as of 2008.[15]

[edit] External links

[edit] References

  1. ↑ School Board
  2. ↑ Student Progression Plan
  3. ↑ Directory
  4. ↑ School board powers and duties, Florida statute
  5. ↑ School board
  6. ↑ Florida Educational Negotiators, "Report on Salary Settlement Information, Spring 2008"
  7. ↑ National Relocation Hamilton County School District
  8. ↑ Grants to Local Educational Agencies - FLORIDA
  9. ↑ School Accountability Report
  10. ↑ Hamilton County School District
  11. ↑ Butler meets with parents, outlines options, Swannee Democrat, July 22, 2009
  12. ↑ Teachers Union Facts, Florida
  13. ↑ Florida School Boards Association members list
  14. ↑ Florida Department of Education, Florida Charter School List by District
  15. ↑ National School Boards Association, Florida Voucher Programs


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