The View from Hillsboro - Advocating for Public Schools

Hillsboro School Foundation

I had the pleasure to attend the HSF dinner and auction yesterday evening. I am guessing that between the fundraising last night and in the phoneaton last fall, the foundation raised around $100,000 to be spent on activities that enrich the classroom experience for the students in the Hillsboro schools. Alongside the HSF we have booster clubs, PTO and PTA groups that collectively raise probably over $600,000 a year, and businesses like Nike and Intel that provide another $100,000 or more in funds when their employees volunteer in our schools.

All that money is spent on activities that enrich the classroom experience in many ways, ranging from art to music to activities before and after school hours. Those hundreds of people who donate and raise funds deserve our deep gratitude. Without their effort and the strong committment of our educators, our schools would be a dull place with mediocre education.

On the other hand, the million dollars that we are able to raise and spend are almost pocket change compared with the over 150 million dollars a biennium that the district receives from the state. Think of what we could do with an additional 1% increase in our state funding.

And how long can we go before the handful of people that are helping with the needed funding for all those activities get burned out?

posted by Unknown @ 4:14 AM