Talbot Describes Pulling School District Out of Dire Financial Straits

Ames School Board Member Bill Talbot is one of three men hoping to be elected to the board on Sept. 10. 

Find his complete campaign announcement below:

In 2009 I was quite concerned with the condition of our school system; particularly the financial status which I believed put the district in the position of being a mere budget year or two away from fiscal takeover by the State. I was not pleased with the status of the administration, and certainly unhappy about the maintenance and care of all of our facilities. I was concerned, although uninformed, about the value of the curriculum. Rather than merely complain, I decided I should try to do something and successfully ran for the Board that fall. 

 I recall at one of the early candidate forums that I made the statement that it would be a steep learning curve; little did I know the time and effort that would be necessary to successfully fill my role as a member of the Board of Directors of the Ames Community School District. While the time expended has been vastly greater than I ever anticipated, the success of the Board has been astounding. In the years 2010 and 2011 the Board worked diligently to reform the budget and more than $4,000,000 was removed from the general fund budget and the only increases in the general fund budget since that time have been directly proportional to increases in operating costs and teacher settlements. Food service was operating more than $800,000 in the red; we cured that deficiency and the food service budget is now operating in the black. Financially, the success of the Board since 2009 has been remarkable.

Part of the reason we were able to accomplish such remarkable financial reform was having Dr. Tim Taylor step into the role as our Superintendent and assist us with an entire restructure of the administration of the district. Not only has the Board’s appointment of Dr. Taylor to the Superintendent position assisted in the financial matters of the school district, Dr. Taylor was able to find superb leaders for the newly reorganized administration, including Dr. Mandy Ross as Associate Superintendent and Director of Curriculum, Darcy Cousens-Wright as Director of Special Programs, Carl Hehr as Director of Technology, Spence Evans, High School Principal, and Gerry Peters as Director of Facilities. These administrators have taken the challenge of less money and more work and have fully changed the complexion of the operations of the Ames Community School District in just a short few years. All this while, our Chief Financial Officer, Karen Shimp enforced the new restrictions on our budget and proposed various methods of savings so that we have gone from being a poorly rated school to being one of the top rated schools in the State for bond ratings.

Our bond rating was critical to the community’s acceptance of the Board’s program to improve elementary schools by building three new and remodeling two. Many people are unaware that the convergence of our fiscal restraint in the budget, low interest rates, and our stellar bond rating have combined so favorably, that the bonding has not increased our baseline of $14.50 tax levy. Since the time I have been elected to the Board, the tax levy for the school has actually decreased.

The Board has completed a long-range facilities plan to bring the rest of our buildings and facilities current. It appears as though we will be able to complete all of our scheduled updates and improvements (except a possible future high school renovation) using and leveraging PPEL funds and 1% sales tax revenues.

On the teaching and learning front, we have shed ourselves of the old, antiquated and outdated plan called World Class Education and replaced it with a teaching and learning model that includes a high degree of focus on teacher improvement. Interestingly, when the State was working through education reform in the 2013 legislature, Ames was frequently cited as an education model, that included instructional coaching, as one model that education reform could be patterned after.

While it has flown a bit under the radar, probably the most significant teaching and learning event has been the implementation of a one-to-one program, putting a personal data device in the hands of every high school student, with plans to have a similar device in the hands of every middle school and many elementary students in the coming few years. Again, we were able to accomplish this change in the educational model within the funds we already receive, resulting in no tax increase to the community. The one-to-one program puts individual mastery and individual programming at the forefront of education, improving the teaching delivery model for our students.

I am anxious to see many of these projects come to completion while maintaining the school tax levy at the lowest level possible. I have decided therefore, to announce that I am a candidate for re-election to the Ames Community School District Board of Directors.