CONTINUED CONCERNS OVER SCHOOL FUNDING IN NEBRASKA

York Public Schools remains extremely concerned about our over-reliance on local property taxes to fund our annual operations. We have been vocal about our concern for several years and, as a result, co-founded “Nebraskans United for Property Tax Reform and Education” with the intent to further the dialogue and pursue legislative action to remedy the issue. We have been working with elected officials for a few years on this important topic and appreciate their efforts and input along the way. We are hopeful that a new bill drafted by Senator Tom Briese’s office, with support from “Nebraskans United for Property Tax Reform and Education,” will gain traction and help move us closer to a legislative solution of this complicated issue.

The following data points clearly illustrate we have a school funding problem despite some saying that high property taxes are due to excessive school spending.

• Nebraska K-12 schools receive 49% of their funding from local property taxes while the national average is 29%. Over 68% of our 2016-17 funding came from local property taxes!

• Nebraska K-12 schools receive 33% of their funding from state sources while the national average is 47%. Just under 17% of our 2016-17 funding came from state sources.

• YPS has 6.5 fewer teachers and 16 fewer support staff members than we did in 2007 despite seeing an increase in student enrollment.

• YPS has had a 0% spending increase since 2014-15 and just an average annual spending increase of 1.3% since 2008-09.

• Our revenue from state equalization aid has plummeted from $2,214,826 in 2014-15 to a paltry $166,566 for 2017-18 causing an even larger over-reliance on local property taxes. The total revenue we have for our budget has decreased over $720,000 since 2014-15 despite a significant increase of more than $1 million in local property taxes. Again, with no spending increase within that time frame.

It remains our hope that our elected officials will pass legislation in this 2018 session to finally address how public schools are funded. If no legislation comes through this year, a logical next step, though one we don’t want to have to look at, could be the pursuit of a potential lawsuit against the State of Nebraska. Several agriculture related organizations, as well as multiple school districts, are regretfully beginning to explore that possibility just in case. If YPS were ever to consider a lawsuit, we would do so with several other partners to ensure that it would come at no financial cost to us.

Some of the main tenets of a potential lawsuit could center around the following legal points.

• The Nebraska State Constitution requires that the State provide a free and public education to all persons between the ages of 5-21 years.
• While the State can delegate the duty for providing the education to school districts, by doing so, it cannot avoid the obligation to finance the “free and public education” guaranteed by the State with a local tax that does not provide substantially equal revenues for each district.
• Students are denied equal protection in their right to a free and public education across the State and school districts are treated differently and are denied equal protection by current legal funding mechanisms.
• Property owners are also compromised by the property tax methods used to finance public education because this financing scheme, which produces widely varied mill levels from district to district, prevents statewide uniformity and proportionality in the imposition of property taxes.

We remain committed to our students and patrons to pursue all possible actions to find meaningful change for school funding in York and all of Nebraska.

A Tribute to My Father-In-Law, Papa

Wednesday, January 24th was a scary day for our family. My father-in-law was diagnosed with colon cancer. It hit our family like a ton of bricks.

I had always known that I loved Dr. Dean, or “Papa,” as many of us call him. Ever since I met him for the first time in 1991, he’s been a role model and someone I admire and respect. When I married his daughter in 1993, I knew I loved him, and his family. I guess what I didn’t know was how much I loved him until last week. I guess I always thought there was a level of love for “in-laws” and it wasn’t as deep as the level of love for your “real” family. I really don’t know what I thought, to be honest.

Papa is as good of a man as you’d ever want to meet. He’s a hard-working, kind, sincere, humble, and honest man. He and “Nan” make a wonderful couple that we truly love to spend time with. Papa is what every person would want in a father-in-law and grandpa. He’s just an amazing person.

I guess I’ve let the “in-law” side of things mask how I feel. Maybe it’s not “cool” to love your in-laws like the rest of your family. I don’t know. There are so many jokes about people not enjoying their in-laws, etc. Nothing could be farther from the truth in my experience. I’ve been blessed with Nan and Papa as my in-laws and they’re amazing. I truly look forward to spending time with them. Nan is my sports buddy as we go to all kinds of different athletic events together. Papa is my fishing buddy and although we seldom catch tons of fish, we always have a good time together.

As I felt the pit in my stomach grow on January 24th and then as tears burned my eyes, my initial grief went towards thoughts of my wife. She loves her dad so much. I cried thinking about how much she was hurting. I struggled to think of things to say and do to help her process this info. I wanted to make sure I was “there” for her as I haven’t always done a great job of that in the past.

My sorrow then turned towards my four children. They love and admire Papa so much as well. They have so many great memories with him too. I struggled to find the words to tell Jeb and Bo. I had to tell Micah via telephone and didn’t want to share too much. Taylor was told by Liesl and I wanted to follow up with her to see how she was doing.

Next, I began to think of Nan. She and Papa are a happily married couple coming up on their 58th anniversary in a few weeks. They are inseparable. I didn’t want to think of Nan without Papa. I don’t like to think about Papa without Nan. They’re one and the same in my eyes…like peanut butter and jelly.
My thoughts then began to linger to others parts of the family, my nieces and nephews, brothers-in-law, and sister-in-law. Papa is such a huge part of all of our lives. We want and need him around for many more years.

After I processed all of these emotions and made mental checklists about each member of the family, I was still overcome with grief. I soon realized it was my own. I love Papa like he is my own. Again, it is weird to describe….I always knew I loved him but I didn’t know to what level until last week. The pain and sadness I felt couldn’t have been any worse if it was my own flesh and blood, my own parents. My love for Papa (and Nan) is not restricted by the title of “in-laws.” We’re simply “family.”

Well, on January 29th, Papa had successful surgery to remove the cancer. We now wait to see if it spread throughout his polyps. He looked good when I saw him after surgery. Tired and in pain, but who wouldn’t be? There was a huge sense of relief throughout the entire family.

This latest dose of “perspective” reminded us all to let our loved ones know how much they mean to us. It reminded us all that nothing should be taken for granted. It reminded me of all the things Papa has taught me over the years.

It made me realize how lucky I am to have married into the family led by Nan and Papa in Omaha, Nebraska. We continue to hope and pray for Papa to make a full recovery and to live many more happy and healthy years.

Papa has helped make me a better man. I'm not as good as I want to be but I'm getting there and he deserves a lot of credit for being the kind of role model we can all look up to.

I love you Nan and Papa.

MOTIVATION -- What Motivates You?

Motivation is a funny thing. It’s often hard to describe or depict in others but you can almost always tell when it is present.

For me, the fear of failure has always been my strongest motivator. As much as I like success and winning, the positive feelings that come with those don’t outweigh the negative feelings that come with failure and losing. Like Bo Ryan used to say, “The losses hurt worse than the wins feel good.”

I guess it’s safe to say that I’m more of an “intrinsic guy” because my motivation almost always come from within me, as opposed to external factors. I’ve had enough failures and losses in my life that I know I choose to do whatever I can to avoid those in the future. I think about it every day. I try to be my own harshest critic and set high expectations for myself that sometimes only I know if I accomplish or not.

Don’t get me wrong, I get motivated by outside factors as well. There’s a pretty healthy “chip on my shoulder” that motivates me continually. “The chip” exists from people telling me what can’t be done, from individuals and organizations not giving “little ol’ York” the respect we’ve earned, and from being looked down upon by others when I was younger. I do my best to manage “the chip” and use it strategically without letting it get out of control.

Growing up in a single-parent home and having to work since 8th grade forced me to look at things a little differently than my affluent friends. You see, working as a garbage man, farm laborer, gas station attendant, construction worker, roofer, security guard, and sod-layer between the ages of 13-17 makes you develop some toughness and can be very motivating. We had to earn what we had, nothing was handed to us, and that has a way of motivating you to work hard, appreciate what you have, and be skeptical of those that are entitled and unappreciative of the blessings in their lives.

I’m glad York gets overlooked by some because “we’re way out west” away from Lincoln and Omaha and not part of an urban, metro area. I will tell you this with unabashed sincerity….York is as good as anyone, regardless of our size. Just because we’re not “Class A” or within “the metro” doesn’t mean we’re not elite. Size does not always matter and bigger doesn’t always mean better. Real talk!

Legislatively, there have been several bills introduced over the past few years that could be motivating to all public school employees. Recently, a bill was introduced to eliminate the State Board of Education and give its control to the Governor’s Office. The Americans for Prosperity – Nebraska Chapter is using extremely distorted student achievement data to call public education in Nebraska “a disgrace.” Motivation is everywhere if we choose to look for it.

I will tell you this, the assault on public education doesn’t motivate me as much as simply serving our children does. I’m in the “kid business” and business is good. I work for kids, not for politicized groups. It’s always been about doing what is best for our students regardless of who supports that or not. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the “bulletin board material” the anti-public school crowd provides but it’s really just “clutter” that doesn’t mean we’re going to do anything different than we already do every day for every student. Our kids deserve our best effort every minute of every day and that has to come from intrinsic motivation; not from outside influences.

Motivation is often needed in January and February as the “winter doldrums” can overtake us if we’re not careful. I choose to use past failures to keep me going. I choose to use “the chip” to keep me fueled and engaged. I choose to keep going to help make YPS better and better.

What motivates you?

Bulletin Board Material Regarding Legislative Bill 295

It was with great interest that I read the recent article in the Omaha World-Herald regarding Legislative Bill 295. This bill, as you might recall, offers income tax credits for donating to private and parochial school scholarships. Despite our state’s massive revenue shortfall, this proposed legislation somehow made its way out of the Revenue Committee last spring and could possibly be up for debate this winter.

A couple of quotes really caught my attention.

Senator Jim Smith of Papillion said the bill would “help curb education costs by reducing the number of public school students. He also argued that it would bring competition into education, which he said would improve outcomes and lower costs.”

I don’t agree. Let’s say York Public Schools, which has approximately 1,400 students, loses 50 children through LB-295. Let’s say those 50 kids are somewhat evenly distributed throughout our K-12 structure with 3-4 per grade level moving on to private/parochial schools due to these “scholarships.” What costs are we going to “save?” We will not be able to reduce the number of bus routes we have. We will need the same amount of teachers. Our facilities will have the same square footage to heat and cool. What exactly do we save with 3-4 fewer students per grade level?

His comment infers that there is not already intense competition within education. Do you think York is not already trying to do everything we can to be the best? Do you think we are sitting by while Seward, Aurora, Grand Island, Hastings, Kearney, and Crete are improving and we are going to accept the status quo? Educators compete every single day. We often “do more with less” as York hasn’t had a spending increase since 2014-15 and averages just a 1.3% annual spending increase since 2008-09. Yet, our student achievement scores on local, state, and national assessments are at an all-time high. We compete with option enrollment, (which most states don’t offer), virtual schools, home schools, parochial and private schools every day. I assure you competition is alive and well.

Senator LouAnn Linehan, who I am proud to say has visited York Public Schools twice already this school year, was credited with saying, “that tax credit scholarships would provide students with an education for less than the average cost per student of a public school education, meaning the money would stretch further.”

“I promise you, in the long run we save money and the kids get a better education,” she said.

These quotes are “bulletin board material,” which I thought I was done with after I hung up my college football cleats and helmet back in 1993. I’d love to see the data that shows the education that these chosen students would receive that cost so much less but is so much better.

According to a March 22, 2017 article in the World-Herald, the NGL Academy in Bellevue, a specialized school that could possibly receive some students on “scholarship” if LB-295 advances, opened up this fall with an annual tuition of $14,500; which is over $2,500 MORE than our public school per-pupil spending average throughout the entire state. Most Class A and B school districts in our state have a cost-per-pupil closer to $11,000.

I will make my own promise. York Public Schools will put the education we provide our children up against anybody and we’re not afraid to say that we’re always a work in progress that strives to get better every single day; just like our amazing public school colleagues all across the state in small, medium, and urban-sized districts. We open our doors for “every student every day” and we “find a way” to create opportunities so all of our students can achieve success and hope for the future. Public education is alive and well in Nebraska and thriving.

Self-Scouting and Studying High Performing Schools

One of the things I learned from my coaching days was the importance of "self-scouting." You see, coaches spend lots of time scouting their opponents and trying to figure out the strengths, weaknesses, and tendencies of those they compete against. I learned early on that this is a very important thing to do but you also need to spend some time analyzing yourself. When I taught 3rd grade and coached high school football and basketball, we would spend time at the end of each season analyzing each of our own games...we wanted to see if we were too predictable in 3rd and short, within the red zone, etc. We wanted to see if our opponents would easily be able to tell that we switched from our triangle-in-two defense to half-court man after timeouts. We charted our tendencies. We thought about "us" and why we did what we did.

In my time as a school administrator, we use the same approach to study the correlates of effective schools and then compare ourselves against high performing organizations in other areas. There is tons of educational research that outlines nine major characteristics of high performing school systems.

* A clear and shared focus
* High expectations for all students
* Effective school leadership
* High levels of collaboration and communication
* Curriculum, instruction, and assessment practices are aligned with state standards
* There is frequent monitoring of learning and teaching
* A focus is placed is on meaningful professional development
* A supportive learning environment
* High levels of family and community involvement

Each summer, my admin team and I will discuss how we are doing in these important, time-tested areas. We will brainstorm ways to enhance certain aspects in need of improvement. We will "self-scout" ourselves to see what we do too much of and what we don't do enough of.

We like to have an unquenchable thirst for improvement that pushes us to move further and further up the mountain. Stay tuned as the York Dukes have much more to accomplish. Dream BIG!