Island school district to see state aid increase
It’s not a windfall for Shelter Island School, but a $35,787 increase in state aid for 2018-19 is welcome news for school officials.
The district’s state aid for the current school year was $590,000. Based on numbers released by Assemblyman Fred Thiele Jr. (I-Sag Harbor), it would rise by 6.14 percent to $626,226.
The Board of Education has been looking at a budget proposal that would see $600,693 in state aid.
“We are glad that the [state] number that was projected didn’t go down,” Superintendent Christine Finn said, noting a decrease sometimes happens.
Mr. Thiele announced that with the adoption of the new state budget, education aid would rise by $914 million, including a $618 million increase in foundation aid as part of the final budget agreement.
Foundation aid is calculated on a formula that considers per pupil costs in the district in various ways, including a state specified calculation and a district contribution to per pupil costs.
Overall, state aid to education for the 2018-19 school year represents a 3.6 percent increase from the current year’s state aid and a 36 percent increase in state aid since 2012, Mr. Thiele said.
The final state budget provides a$26.6 billion in aid to the states’s more than 700 school districts, according to Mr. Thiele.
