Student enrollments are down. School spending is up.

At least 12,000 fewer Maine students, at least $536 million a year more in spending, compared to seven years ago.

As a result, the amount of money spent to educate the average public school pupil in Maine has shot up 50 percent in the past seven years, an average increase of more than 7 percent a year.

The reasons given for the trend vary. Education officials agree that no single line item is to blame. A combination of factors, including special education mandates, health insurance premiums and fuel costs, contributes to the higher cost of educating a Maine public school student today, they say.

Has the fewer students/more money trend led to a corresponding rise in the quality of education? A glance at the Maine Education Assessment test scores suggests it has not.

No matter the reason, one thing is clear: Maine taxpayers, especially those who own property, appear to be unhappy about paying for the increasing costs.

In June, voters approved a requirement that the state pick up 55 percent of K-12 public education costs, more than 10 percent higher than the amount it currently contributes.

And in November, another citizen initiative, one that would cap property taxes at 1 percent of assessed value, may well have enough support to pass into law, according to tracking polls.

Both pieces of legislation are aimed at reducing property taxes, the majority of which pay for education.

Pressure on taxpayers

In 2002, during his short-lived bid as an independent gubernatorial candidate, David Flanagan campaigned on what he saw as a troubling trend. Although he has since faded from public view, Flanagan has not put the issue aside.

He scoured the State House Law Library recently for statistics that would bolster his argument. And he found them. Maine’s student-teacher ratio in 2002-2003 was the fifth lowest in the county. That, he said, accounts in great part for the higher spending.

Compared to seven years ago, Maine schools employ 1,077 more teachers and at least 400 more administrative and instructional staff, as enrollment has declined.

“That’s where the biggest expense in Maine is,” Flanagan said, referring to the ratio. “We have an unusually low class size on average.”

While that may be desirable in order to give students a superior education, he said there is no evidence Maine’s low ratios have done that. Scores by Maine’s 11th-grade students in 2003-2004 compared to 1998-1999 scores show little progress overall in the four testing categories of reading, writing, math and science.

However, a different educational statistic is likely driving the call for tax reform and tax relief. In 1994, Maine’s schools got 44.1 percent of their money from local property taxes, according to Congressional Quarterly. By 2001-2002, the amount contributed at the local level for school spending was up to 49.6 percent.

Over the same period, the state went from contributing 48.3 percent of total K-12 education costs to 43.6 percent. Federal funding fell from 7.6 percent to 6.8 percent.

More to come

State education officials predict an even greater decline in student enrollments over the next decade. That means the cost of education per pupil will continue going up, said Duke Albanese, former state education commissioner who has 35 years as an education administrator.

“It will go up because you can’t reduce the school system as quickly as the number of kids are declining,” he said.

Especially in rural areas, a drop in student enrollment will not result in an equal decline in spending.

Sending a school bus on a route to pick up 20 kids instead of 30 likely would cost at least the same amount of money to pay for the bus and the driver and the gasoline. When inflation and cost-of-living increases are factored in, probably more.

Operating a school to educate 100 students instead of 120 takes as many administrators, custodians and the same amount of heating oil, said Albanese.

The cost to educate a single student will keep rising until a bus route is eliminated or a school is closed.

Based on the state’s school funding formula, which takes into account student enrollment, school districts get less state money as they lose students. That transfers more of the burden onto local property taxpayers.

That reality prompted Gov. John Baldacci to encourage school districts to consolidate, thereby hoping to cut expenses. If they do, he has promised them more state money.

Buckfield’s example

In Buckfield and surrounding towns, the number of students has gone down 15 percent over the past seven years. Over the same period, the cost per student went from $5,720 to $8,755, an increase of 53 percent.

Meanwhile, in the five-year period from 1998-1999 to 2003-2004, MEA scores of Buckfield high school juniors improved slightly in reading, writing, math and science.

William Shuttleworth, SAD 39’s superintendent until this year, pointed to several factors that drove up spending. Topping the list was health insurance costs, whose premiums keep soaring, he said. The district picks up 89 percent of a family plan for teachers. “That’s been a sacred cow for teachers,” he said.

Next comes special education, with its many federal mandates. In 1999, one of the district’s students was diagnosed as autistic, requiring extensive and costly services. When Shuttleworth left this year, the district had seven students with that diagnosis receiving services, he said.

Statewide, the number of students eligible for special education services climbed 14 percent from 33,055 in 1996 to 37,784 in 2003. In 2000, the most recent year data was available, 16.7 percent of Maine’s public school students were identified as eligible for special education services. That ranked Maine fourth in the nation.

Education experts say one of the biggest reasons the number of teachers has continued to grow in Maine even as the number of students has declined is due to the rising number of special education students, who require more individualized attention.

Shuttleworth concedes the school districts must become more creative in devising strategies for regionalizing and consolidating special education services and realize savings by sharing in the overall cost.

Flanagan said the state must provide more oversight in determining which students become eligible for services and which services they should access, and not simply leave it up to a few individuals at a given school to make that call.

“I detect a pattern of randomness as to who gets to be eligible,” he said. “It cries out for some sort of overall policy.”

As with special education, education experts say state and federal mandates have also created greater bureaucracy, helping to explain the more than 400 additional administrative and non-teacher instructional staff in Maine schools compared to seven years ago.

School officials said the public often thinks a reduction in students should automatically trigger a reduction in teachers and administrators, but mandates and other demands of the system prevent that.

They agree there are places where they are able to cut school spending. The consolidation of buildings and services is one approach more districts may consider as their enrollments continue to shrink. Also, cooperative purchasing can cut costs, as some municipalities already have discovered.

If they do not find ways to trim spending, voters may end up doing it for them through the ballot box.

Shuttleworth said he is sympathetic.

“I think it’s un-American that someone should have to sell their home” because they can’t afford their taxes, he said.

A more equitable solution, one that would not threaten the quality of education, would be to raise the sales tax by 1 cent, he said.

“That would be the quickest way to solve it.”