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Take THAT, voters. We’re closing your schools 1 day a week because you voted against the tax hike . . .



The Iron County Utah school district has something to say: they're going to a 4-day work week because voters didn’t approve $3 million in new taxes.

$3 million may not sound like a lot, but it’s an increase of 10% over 2025. And in 2025 the school district overspent by another 10% without prior approval. Does this help explain why Utah voters are cheesed? See links below.

The population change in Iron County has averaged 2.5% for the past several decades, and it was 2.5% again in 2025. So nobody can claim a bunch of parents migrated from California, and local Utah schools need a big cash infusion to deal with that.

75% of the Iron County school budget is salaries and benefits. I don’t know how this compares to your town, but it seems in the zone. The numbers suggest that Iron County teachers will be getting 10% more salary and benefits in 2026, despite a stable student enrollment. And got 10% more the prior year . . . .

Okay, back to the 4-day school week. How exactly how does this save money? Are there going to be 10% fewer teachers? The same staffing, but teachers get paid 10% less because they have 3 day weekends all the time? The school board is blackmailing parents with the threat of school closures, and has some ‘splaining to do, on their math.

If actually happens – a 4 day school week – it means parents will have to pay for private childcare on those cancelled days. Shifting education costs away from the schools directly to the parents. In the case of middle school and higher students, I suppose the presumption is that they will simply roam the streets or play videogames at home all day.

Please let me correct any misimpression I may be giving that the Iron County Utah school district is bad at whatever it is they’re up to. A 4-day school week may sound insane, but it’s probably a more evolved tax heist than simply threatening to fire a bunch of favorite teachers. That’s the scheme which lots of other school districts try to pull . . .

I’m just sayin’ . . .



Denied its $2.8M tax hike, a Utah district considers four-day school week to save money

Notable items included in the FY2025 Amended and FY2026 Preliminary Budget
SusanInFlorida
31-35, F
45 replies 62 views 4 days ago4 d
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wildbill83 · 41-45, M Best Comment
Even if they were given the money, they'd only blow it on more "administrative" staff... not a dime would go towards actually improving education...

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exchrist · 36-40
@wildbill83 that’s why we need new leadership and a fresh start too many administrators not enough teachers no one is having kids and the material hasn’t been updated since “Gone With The Wind was published. Why would anyone want to have kids that would learn about ww2 as the glory days of America?
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@wildbill83 i've marked this "best comment".

school districts will defend themselves by saying those administrative staff are required to comply with federal education subsidies. To administer the internet/tech. To perform psychological assessments of students. Crime prevention.

When I worked at a bank I "blew up the room" once when I showed a chart at an executive meeting showing that administrative/back office staff was growing twice as fast as customer facing staff, and as fast as customers.
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Crazywaterspring · 61-69, M
@wildbill83 Athletic programs fall under the admin setting. Does expensive HS football contribute anything to education?
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exchrist · 36-40
If enrollment decreases school taxes should too? Therefore if this strategy is intended to reduce entitlement costs, which it appears it would; by attempting to externalize education costs onto parents. that means budget cuts MIGHT cover fewer students. Otherwise an audit will be necessary. Where did those 10% reductions go instead?
Reduction in school costs associated with the approaching wave of teacher retirements should also be welcomed. That shifts the burden of education (salary) costs to retirement payments.
Therefore more people are going to move to long established states on the coasts where schooling has been built into society for longer
If it can be demonstrated that federal funding cuts are the root cause. That will assist in ousting our tyranny
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exchrist · 36-40
@SusanInFlorida I’d like to see reorganization as a debt reduction strategy 3 or 4 main groups. Just a reorganization of the incorporated United States of America would be better individualized based around sections and their collective needs. Water shortages in the southwest require policies and infrastructure priorities largely inappropriate for the east coast, gulf coast, or midwest
What is needed in Alaska doesn’t apply to Iowa
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dale74 · M
@exchrist most of the department of education money was taged with spending on key areas those have been removedband placed on individual states to choose to fund them or not. The federal money is now block grants to the state. Now i dont know what state teacher pay is but 20% pay raise over 2 years is a lot. Means going from lets say 50k to 60k in two years.
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exchrist · 36-40
@dale74 teachers are often underpaid schools underfunded imagine being paid 50k to supervise groups of 30 or more children all day everyday. Certainly daycare costs more than that per year!, especially for 30+ children.
Not the point. If inflation is routinely 3% to 7% yearly. And salary increases are few and far between. A 20 percent increase implemented over 2 years is only about half, if that, of cost of living increases over those same 2 years. Plus a 20% increase would cover only somewhere between 4 and 6 years of inflation. Teachers rarely get salary increases at all. When state or federal budgets get passed educational funding is the first to be reduced, in favor of war funding, (at the federal level). In many places federal funding is the only education funding.
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samueltyler2 · 80-89, M
Often what a 4 day work week means is more hours worked per day, so the work week is still 37.5 or 40 hours per week. The school does save on institutional costs, but not salaries and benefits.
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samueltyler2 · 80-89, M
@SusanInFlorida so you are suggesting full year schooling not to enhance education, but to prevent break ins? Do you think of school only sad day care for kids? I actually would be interested in the statistics backing up your claim. What are the breakins for? Is there enough left in schools during the summer to steal?
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@samueltyler2 i am suggesting 12 month public school education. there is no reason for kids to have 3 months off. we're not a subsistence agrarian society who depends on children to work the fields.
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samueltyler2 · 80-89, M
@SusanInFlorida i am not necessarily against it, but then you have to pay the teachers, and ancillary staff for all 12 Months. You also may not be aware of the summer camp industry that would then be out of business.
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Subsumedpat · 36-40, M
Things like this seem to be happening more these days, we get a group of free spenders in office who way over spend then try to blame it on the residents for not raising taxes.
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Subsumedpat · 36-40, M
@SusanInFlorida We don't have to have a balanced budget, it is ok if we spend more in times of greater need like we did during world war 2 . After the wat the ration to GDP to debt was !06% , we got it down to 23% in 1974. Likely would have been paid off had we not blundered into that crazy Asian war. What you can't do is what we are doing , have a constantly rising debt ratio with no emergency to justify it, there is no winning end game at the end of that.
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@Subsumedpat that's the Keynesian viewpoint. but the problem is that we're deficit spending 24/7, in good times and bad.
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Subsumedpat · 36-40, M
@SusanInFlorida Yes, in good times we should be paying down debt from bad times. At some point it will no longer work, we are not sure exactly where that point is because there has never been an economy as big as ours to observe
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Crazywaterspring · 61-69, M
Better trim the day than consolidate schools. Public schools in Texas are being closed because the governor is holding tax revenue. Why? To give our tax money to scammy charter schools, homeschoolers and "Christian" academies.

Got to keep working class kids undereducated.
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@Crazywaterspring but putting charter schools on an equal footing with public schools was voter approved right? because charter schools have good outcomes for student test scores?
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Crazywaterspring · 61-69, M
@SusanInFlorida We didn't vote on those charter schools. That was the legislature's doing. Good outcomes? They pick who to admit, so no one who needs special ed etc. When a charter school is in the news it is always about someone skimming funds, nepotism etc. Abbott loves "school choice" meaning more money for his "Christian" academy buddies.
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@Crazywaterspring every school should get to pick who they admit. and expel who are disruptive. bring back reform schools for the 2-5% of kids who are determined to make attendance miserable for their fellow students and their teachers
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meJess · F
Will the kids learn to read, write and add up in the 4 days or just be told what to think?
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samueltyler2 · 80-89, M
@SusanInFlorida I might agree with some of those, but a visit to a museum, DC or NYC if used as a teaching device, can be very educational. There really is nothing like putting history into perspective for it to become a fundamental building block to education. The real problem, with that, is there are really far fewer such trips than in my era, because of loss of funding for them.
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@samueltyler2 i'm not dissing museums. but putting kids on a 3 hour bus ride to DC or NYC is not the best way to expose them to the Museum of Modern Art or the smitsonian. there are documentaries which are well revierwed and more coherent than simply wandering around while your teacher mumbles
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samueltyler2 · 80-89, M
@SusanInFlorida i dislike 1-3 hour bus rides as well, and can only speak for myself, but those museum trips were invaluable parts of both my science and art education.
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Strictmichael75 · 61-69, M
No longer the land of the Free
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AdmiralPrune · 41-45, M
Do you do anything other than regurgitate news?
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NativePortlander1970 · 51-55
The question that should be asked is this, WHY IN THE FUCK DID THEY GO 10% OVER BUDGET IN THE FIRST PLACE? Time to audit the personal financials of admins and managers.
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SusanInFlorida · 31-35, F
@NativePortlander1970 i'm convinced there have been several audits. and that nobody was fired. that the expense overruns were escalated to district managers, local school boards, state wide regulatory agencies. who studied the data extensively before acting.

and that nobody lost their jobs as part of this process
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NativePortlander1970 · 51-55
@SusanInFlorida Time for the feds to move in
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