Winooski reaps rewards of Vermont school spending upheaval

A wide view of the Winooski circle. Photo by Catherine Morrissey

While many Vermont school districts suffered the consequences of steep budget increases related to a new state education funding model — resulting in the rejection of almost 30% of school district budget proposals by voters in March — the Winooski school district in some ways has benefited from the change.

The complicated state funding formula gave additional weight to students who speak a first language other than English and who live in low-income households. For Winooski, which has a high population of students in those categories, that meant extra funding for certain school positions that it otherwise would have had to cut, Wilmer Chavarria, superintendent of Winooski Schools, wrote in an email response to several Winooski News questions.

Previously funded by federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief grants related to Covid-19 and a grant from the Boston-based Barr Foundation, multiple special positions would have been cut this coming summer with the expiration of the federal money, Chavarria said. These positions include a literacy coach; a coordinator of creative approaches to quality education, such as early college programs and career and personalized learning; a math tutor; and multilingual liaisons.

Winooski Schools’ budget now includes funding for those positions. The state funding formula also allowed the district to add two pre-kindergarten classrooms.

All of this went into a school budget that totaled nearly $32 million for the coming fiscal year, a 20.4% increase from 2023. Winooski voters approved the budget 922-397 on Town Meeting Day on March 5.

Another ballot item, asking whether the school district should accept $2.7 million in federal funding — a reduction of about 35 percent — for special programs and compensatory education, also passed. And Winooski voters elected three school trustees, all of whom ran unopposed. 

Still, some Winooski residents complained about the steep school budget increase as they left the polls in March, citing the pain of rising property taxes. Daniel Kane, 47, said education expenses have driven up the cost of living in Winooski. While he “wants a good education for the younger generation for Winooski,” he also believes the district needs to cut spending, he said. 

Among those who supported the school budget proposal, Molly Coffey said the schools need the funding. The 41-year-old mother of two children who attend Winooski Schools, Coffey acknowledged that better education comes with a cost for taxpayers. 

Sarah Wolff, a Winooski resident and teacher in St Albans, shared the view that the schools need the extra money. “We should be meeting kids where they are,” Wolff said on Town Meeting Day. “Public education isn’t one size fits all, and we need to be helping kids succeed in any way we can.”

After the widespread school budget rejections in March, state legislators have considered retooling the spending formula. Chavarria envisioned that wealthier school districts — which took on the steepest spending increases under the state formula — could put pressure on lawmakers to reduce or remove the current accounting for the marginalized groups, which could force districts like Winooski’s to cut staff and programs, he said.

The superintendent also said he remains concerned about the future of support for special education. “Our special education costs continue to rise due to both the level of student need and the scarcity of services and service providers, while our special education support from the state continues to shrink,” he said.

Pressure on lawmakers to reduce support for school diversity initiatives, which are important for Winooski, also remain, Chavarria said. The current state budgeting formula would maintain Winooski Schools’ ability to offer programs based on data, he said.

Lawmakers, though, could “chip away from the current supports built in the funding calculations for communities of color and English learners,” Chavarria said. “While I remain cautiously optimistic for the future, I also know that there are clear signs of explicit anti-equity efforts at all levels of government that go unchallenged.”