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Illinois School Board Journal - ARCHIVES
July-August, 2003
ASK THE STAFF:
Typical costs can help boards budget
Gerald Glaub, IASB deputy executive director for communications and policy services, answers the question for this issue.
Question: How much should we reasonably budget to send board members to conferences and workshops?
Answer: That's a question frequently posed to IASB staff, especially when budgets are tight. A school board's need for information and knowledge seems to increase as available funds decrease.
The best answer won't be the same for every school board, of course. The size of a school board's own development budget varies with the number of conferences and workshops the board needs to cover and the number of board members who need to take part. Other variables include the distance to the programs and whether they are located in small cities or major metropolitan areas (where costs are higher).
To help project outlays for your board, here are some typical costs for various types of programs gleaned from members of the IASB staff:
1. A typical IASB division meeting held at a school will cost $14 to $20 per person for registration (including meal). Division meetings held at restaurants will run $25 to $30 per person. The fee for a special speaker can add $5 or more. If your board pays 36 cents per mile for driving to a meeting 50 miles away, that adds $36. The total: $50 to $65 for one person traveling alone or $85 to $110 for a driver and three riders.
2. Workshops vary widely in cost, but you can expect to pay $125 to $175 per person for most IASB workshop registrations. If the workshop is 100 miles away, add $72 for mileage at 36 cents a mile. If driving time runs into several hours, you may want to add an overnight stay. With meals, add $125 a day for staying overnight in a small city or $200 a day in a large metropolitan area. Typical total: from $150 to $200 for a drive-in workshop and up to $375 for an overnighter.
3. For the Joint Annual Conference, consisting of three days in Chicago, figure $270 per person for registration and $220 a day for lodging and meals. (Specially negotiated hotel rates are much lower for the Annual Conference than they are at other times.) Travel by rail and taxi would run about $125 (from the middle of the state) or about the same for automobile mileage. For driving, estimate $25 to $30 a day for parking. The average bill for one board member attending all three days: $1,000 with additional mileage costs for boards from southern Illinois.
4. Some costs associated with a national convention will run about the same as costs for the state conference, but some will be much more. Registration will run $500 to $700 per person, and lodging will usually run $100 a day higher. Also, travel will more likely involve airlines, taxis or rental cars running upwards of $350 or more. In budgeting, find out first where the convention is located, check convention hotel rates and either get airline ticket prices locked in or calculate at the standard mileage rate for driving. Depending on location, a four-day convention may vary from $2,000 to $3,000 per person.
How much should be budgeted each year for a seven-member school board faced with different needs and a wide variety of choices among conferences and workshops? How about figuring an average amount per board member to come up with a total (even though some board members may tap the budget more than others)?
If each board member attends two division meetings, the state conference and two workshops, that should total in the vicinity of $1,500 to $2,000 each, or $10,000 to $14,000 for the total school board. A specific number of slots for national conventions should be figured and added to the board total.
Each school board, of course, must determine for itself whether the final total is necessary and reasonable, keeping in mind the district's total budget for in-service training and the fact that businesses typically allocate from 7 to 10 percent of their salary budgets for professional development.
Also keep in mind that school board training in a small district will consume a larger portion of the total in-service training budget than it will in a large district. All boards, regardless of district size, have the same number of members, roughly the same needs for information and know-how, and will consequently spend about the same amounts on board member training.