Tonight there is a personnel subcommittee meeting on the job descriptions for a few of the new positions in next year’s budget. This budget season Lynn Public Schools is expecting an increase in funding. The positions that the Fiscal Year 2020 budget proposes to add next year are an important reflection of the priorities of the Lynn Public Schools. I thought the following charts were a helpful way to visualize those new positions and the priorities they reflect.
The first chart shows the categories of the net new positions, the 64.5 FTEs that are being added to the Lynn Public Schools without offsetting reductions elsewhere. You can see that special education and English learner education are top priorities for new investment. The Discovery Academy, a new 8th grade offering at Lynn Tech, is also a key addition. The Discover Academy positions are visible in orange below, spread out among the various categories. The new technology positions are meant to directly address cybersecurity needs, highlighted by the issues we had this year.
The second chart shows that the vast majority of the new positions are student facing.
The budget is currently a proposal and still under review by the School Committee. We have a public hearing next week, and all are invited to come and share their feedback and priorities. We may get more funding depending on the result of the funding debate on Beacon Hill. As we have those conversations, I think it is helpful to step back from the line-by-line review of the $160M budget to think about where we want to focus the additional funding. The distribution of new positions is one way to do that.