School budget deserving of voters’ support

EDITORIAL: Voters should continue to support Manville schools

By:
   Manville Superintendent of Schools Donald Burkhardt is a man on a mission.
   Spend five minutes with him, and you’ll know why Manville schools are better today than they were yesterday, and why they’ll be better next year.
   Ask him about the curriculum, and you’ll know why Manville students are improving their scores on standardized tests by leaps and bounds.
   Ask him about the budget, and you’ll get not only a visionary’s "big picture," but also a hands-on manager’s detailed accounting.
   We suspect that’s a large part of the reason voters have turned out to support Dr. Burkhardt’s two previous budgets, and we believe they should do so again.
   The budget this year is slated at $14.7 million — barely 2.8 percent more than last year’s because of a new state regulation limiting increased spending in school districts.
   The law, S1701, set a spending increase limit of less than 3 percent, which could be severely damaging to a district like Manville. While there may be school districts in New Jersey that will improve their spending practices under the constraints this law imposes, Manville isn’t one of them.
   For nearly 10 years straight, Manville voters defeated school budgets, forcing cuts such that when Dr. Burkhardt arrived in town, we were near the bottom of the state in spending per pupil.
   Low test scores, discipline troubles and few students pursuing college were the legacies of these actions.
   The law unfortunately limits Manville’s ability to restore the kind of education many other districts have, but Dr. Burkhardt’s mission has been to do what’s most needed as soon as possible.
   And this year’s budget proves that — for example, passage of the budget will fund reopening the libraries at ABIS and Manville High School.
   It’s almost inconceivable that libraries at the schools had been almost completely done away with, but that’s what had happened.
   The budget also will complete a new language arts curriculum package already begun. Curriculum has occupied a big part of Dr. Burkhardt’s energy in the last few years because the district’s material was outdated when he arrived.
   Manville schools look better than they have in years, Manville students are doing better than they have in years — and Manville voters should support the school budget as they have in recent years.
   Working with Dr. Burkhardt in these efforts has been a productive school board, four members of which are seeking re-election.
   Dorothy Bradley, Lisa Galasso, Michael Impellizeri and George Jakelsky are on the ballot for four seats, and all have been valuable members of the board, deserving of your vote to return for additional terms.
   Take the time to get out and vote Tuesday — join Dr. Burkhardt in his mission to improve the schools.