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District Level School Expenditures – In$ite Data
Click here to
view and/or print the In$ite expenditure categories
chart in PDF format (43 KB)
Four years ago and in collaboration with RIDE, the General Assembly decided to establish a detailed and informative system of reporting educational expenditures for all school districts. They selected software called the In$ite Financial Analysis Model for
Education™ which tracks all expenditures through the local school district to the school sites. “All expenditures” includes expenditures from all funding sources – e.g., federal, state, and foundation grants, general revenue budget, total food service expenditures regardless of revenue source, and debt service if part of the school district’s budget.
For more detail on In$ite, its implementation and the specifics which define its large categories, please refer to the
User's Guide. Detailed expenditure accounts for each school are also available
under Infoworks! 2001
Reports.
A word of caution
Please be cautious about making assumptions for your school or district. Often district decisions or other factors particular to a district easily explain figures that initially seem unusually high or low. Appropriate school or district financial managers should be able to answer your questions or concerns.
Per pupil expenditures
All expenditure dollars on the school and district charts are expressed as a per pupil figure. These per pupil expenditures are based on the Average Daily Membership
(ADM) of students and then their full-time equivalent (FTE) in their respective programs. Per pupil is not a simple head-count, but a count by FTE. A child enrolled for an entire school year in a full-day program equals one FTE. A half-day kindergarten student enrolled for a full year equals ½ or .5 FTE. If a student was not enrolled for the full year, his or her FTE would decrease by the time not enrolled. Thus, the half-day kindergarten student enrolled for only half a year equals 1/4 or .25 FTE.
Each student’s FTE is then divided by the educational programs provided to that student. A child’s participation in Special Education Resource or English as a Second Language is counted only as a percentage of that child’s day. In a six-period day, a child who spends one period in a specific program will count as one sixth for that program. Six such periods a day for the full school year would account for the full-time equivalent (FTE) and for a full year’s per pupil expenditure for that program.
The virtual RI school district
In order to compare one district to a state average, we’ve created a “virtual” district by adding every districts’ expenditures and dividing by the total “Average Daily Membership” enrollment for the state. The Virtual District does not imply a standard for best fiscal practices; it merely serves to orient each individual district’s spending to the current practices of the state as a whole.
Average daily membership (ADM)
Average daily membership (ADM) calculates an average of the number of days all students are formally members of a district and/or school per year.
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