PRESS RELEASE:
Campaign for Vermont Publishes Report on Savings Provided by Shared Education Services
Non-profit seeking to grow VT’s middle class finds education savings while expanding services for students.
MONTPELIER, VERMONT - This week, Campaign for Vermont Prosperity (CFV) published a report titled "Finding Savings Through Shared Services in Vermont Schools." The report focuses on leveraging Education Service Agencies (ESAs) to improve the efficiency of services being provided to students. A policy recommendation the organization put out in March recommended moving to this model, but the latest report put a number on the cost-savings potential. The Act 73 Task Force voted on Monday to advance a similar ESA model as their recommendation to the Legislature.
Across the country, the majority of states use ESAs as regional delivery vehicles so that small and mid-sized districts can access programs and operations they couldn’t afford alone. ESAs commonly run career & technical education centers, regional special-education programs and day-treatment sites, cooperative purchasing and transportation hubs, IT and data services, and large-scale professional development—all activities that gain from scale and centralized expertise.
"In Vermont, we call our ESAs Supervisory Unions," said CFV Executive Director Ben Kinsley, "But we don’t leverage them for their potential efficiencies of scale and expanded service outputs the same way that other states do." Vermont currently has 52 Supervisory Unions (SUs) that serve 119 school districts. The report examines how consolidating SUs into approximately 15 regional ESAs (aligned with Career and Technical Education centers) might generate cost savings, increase service scope, and improve resource allocation.
The report lists over a dozen services that could be provided by an ESA/SU and examines the costs savings that other states have realized in specific areas. The report then applies those research findings to Vermont's spending patterns to estimate the potential savings. The result? $291 to $334 million in potential savings. The report highlights that these savings could be achieved while at the same time access to services like language, arts, AP coursework, and other specialized programming could be expanded for students.
"As a former Deputy Secretary of Education, this is the right thing to do for our students and our taxpayers," said CFV President Pat McDonald, "we need to rethink the way we deliver education, and this shows us a pathway for how to do it."
The full report can be found on the organization's website - CampaignForVermont.org
CFV is a nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy organization dedicated to the vision of a more prosperous Vermont and growing middle class. They seek to accomplish these goals by reconnecting Vermonters to their government and advocating for more transparent policy-making.
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