By Dr. Vicki King, Superintendent, Salem School District – A Special To KCE
As the superintendent for the Salem School District, I believe that honesty and transparency serve as the foundation of trust between a school district and its community. Recently, a headline about our upcoming referendum created some confusion and concern. I am committed to transparency, accountability, and the truth; and I want to make sure our community knows that the error made by the new source is not something we are going to ignore.
The headline in question misstated the amount we are seeking through the referendum, listing it as $1 million instead of $2 million. This amount with the work the Board and I have done to cut costs, will ensure our community’s tax dollars remain as consistent as possible and allow us to maintain current programs should the referendum pass. While the body of the article was accurate, the headline—the most visible and impactful part—did not reflect the full truth. This error, though unintentional, may have caused unnecessary doubt. Once we learned about the error from a conscientious Salem community member, we immediately reached out to have it corrected, and I requested it be reprinted in full. The newsource has since apologized for their mistake and their inability to run a full reprint.
Salem’s School Board and I have diligently looked into a wide range of ways to further cut costs, but like our taxpayers, inflation rates have risen beyond what our state funding has been providing. Salem- and other districts in communities like ours, have been literally “locked” into the lowest state funding support bracket since 1993. Until state funding can offset the increase in these rising costs, the majority of districts across the state will require continued support from their communities to help us make ends meet.
The Salem School Board and I work continuously to balance the academic needs of our students while also examining every option to reduce costs and streamline operations for our taxpayers. These options also include seeking opportunities to partner with other districts willing to share leadership positions and other resources. We are also actively engaging with community leaders and business owners who are facing the same financial challenges. Thus far, these conversations have left me humbled.
I am incredibly thankful Kevin allowed me the space to make sure our community members have the information they need to make an informed decision – especially because this issue affects the livelihoods of both our students and our taxpayers.
If you have questions about the referendum, I encourage you to reach out. Call me, email me, or visit in person. Listed on our website are over a dozen opportunities we have scheduled to talk with our community about this very topic. We have scheduled two of these conversations at Salem, but we want to make these more accessible so the vast majority will be held at local businesses in the mornings, after business hours, and on the weekends. I want our community to be able to ask about what we are doing with their taxpayer dollars. I want to give them a window into how we are spending the state funds we receive and their taxpayer dollars because they deserve to know.
30 Responses
Funding schools should be a no-brainer. People are dumb enough as it is— making sure the kids in our community are well-educated should always be a priority.
Ya. As kusd wants 23 million. That isn’t a no brainer. You cant mod manage funds and the just ask for more and say it’s a no brainer while raising property taxes yearly. What a dumb comment
No, KUSD wants $23 million per year for the next 5 years, which is a whopping $115 million tax increase on KUSD taxpayers. Let’s tell the truth, because KUSD sure as hell won’t!
Except the VAST majority of the “funding schools” part is used for even more employees/administrators and huge pay raises. Unfortunately, as has been proven over the past few decades, the KIDS get nothing except dumber. Pride flags and 72 genders and boys can “become” girls, instead of MATH, READING and WRITING.
Yes, you are right. However, questioning cost and investments should always be challenged. It’s always interesting how government can raise you tax bill 15-20% in a year and that’s acceptable. Most people aren’t getting those kind of raises, more like 2-3% if your lucky. When I went to school in the 70’s and 80’s we didn’t nearly have the educational benefits these school offer now. We need the basic’s first, good well paid teachers first and a good meal will get 85% of the student to make strides in life. All these extra activities hasn’t necessarily amounted to an ambitious or motivated adults prospering in life, some but not as many as when I grew up.
I blame a lot on the electronic mind numbing effects these phone have created on a young persons brain. Try to talk to a young person without them looking or responding to idle chatter on their phone, it’s an epidemic. People under 30 have had their brains programmed to think the phone is a requirement to thinking, very scary what these electronic devices have done to our younger society. Don’t get me wrong, much good has come from these phones, but I wonder if it makes it hard to function and be productive for the younger generation. Older folks still know that the phone is a tool at work not a pacifier.
Silly, this is operatoonal..which is not education, it’s everything around teachers.
lol, once they learn how to cut costs maybe I’ll consider throwing more money at them.
Actually, blindly throwing more money out the window on the Kenosha unified School district is a real no brainer, it takes no brains at all to be that stupid. Time to say no, and let the chips fall where they may. If it’s one thing we should have all learned from covid is that the teachers and the teachers union don’t give a damn about teaching, the governor doesn’t give a damn about learning and the whole thing is a fraud. Shut down all the sports programs, sell off everything in the way of mothballed real estate and get the bread and water ready for the freebie meal programs. All of the work requiring advanced technical degrees will be covered by people from countries that still spend way less per student and care way more about learning then the United States does.
She looks good
almost a 10
It’s the eyebrows isn’t it
Pull your kids out of the Public School system!
Government schools.
Salem is an amazing school and Dr. King is doing a great job. I will 100% be voting for this in April. If you are hesitant at all, at least give her the opportunity to explain it and answer any questions you may have. Salem is NOT KUSD!
Good for you, I won’t be voting yes. Like someone else mentioned you can’t fix spending problems with money.
Yes or no?
KUSD could learn slit from Dr. King, take notes.
What do you expect from an IL Dem? They don’t know how to actually balance a budget or save money; just how to spend, spend, spend and say “oops” when they inaccurately report it.
(She’s from Woodland District in Gurnee)
I would like to know what is the state legislators doing with billions of dollars of surplus of my taxpayer dollars? Why is the legislators / local legislators not fighting to bring back our money? Let’s not forget of all the billions of dollars are already sent to the state. They’re holding up for what. If the state legislator send the money to our local schools….
It’s our money not theirs but the politics is gone ridiculous. Send us our money back to the schools. They could attach contingencies how the money is used in the schools. For hiring teachers facilities etc etc.
These people need to be voted out.
The Sheriff’s Department is also making sure the tax payers dollars are NOT being used the appropriate way. They will surveillance a drug transaction then charge another offender (guilty or not) so they get paid.
A quick search 4.5 billion dollars. Billion dollars. That is money that we’ve sent. Amanda what are you doing to get this money back.???
Samantha Kerkman where is all the money we get for sales tax from Amazon Uline etc. It has to be the tens of a millions of dollars the county gets back. Where is that money going? Give that money to local school districts. It’s our money??? It’s our kids money??
What’s her salary?
Kerkman’s in the hole for years after acquiring loans to pay for more & more infrastructure – mostly roads using Kenosha’s AAA credit rating. Sounds more like a Ponzi scheme to me.
Use credit to build infrastructure, pay off (mostly interest) with taxpayer dollars but those loans never get paid off.
Not long before the City gets into a real fiscal crisis.
As a Kenosha Co resident I’m not interested in paying for the crap that goes on in our public schools, but of course I have no choice since I am a homeowner.
Go kick rocks
This lady is evil. She goes around calling parents liars. Telling them they are horrible people and putting her finger uncomfortably close to faces while threatening them. She is a horrible person to be having such a position keeping our kids safe when she threatens adults.
And yet No Money for a police officer in the school.
1,000. Children in Salem Grade school and no School Resource Officer (SRO).
Why ?
They can afford it. They just choose not to
I went to a Salem school board meeting a couple years ago whilst they were voting to increase the mil rate and learned a couple interesting facts:
1) Salem grade school has the largest campus in the entire state, this is before the work that was recently completed.
2) The state wide average is 75 cents out of every dollar goes towards teachers wages and benefits. Not here is Salem. According to their own accountant that attended the meeting 85 cents out of every dollar here in Salem was going towards teachers wages and benefits! Not the huge campus. Not curriculum.
“Average annual salary was $63,621 and median salary was $57,800. (sounds terrible until you realize they get 180 days off a year) Salem School District average salary is 36 percent higher than USA average and median salary is 33 percent higher than USA median salary.” -Govsalaries.com
If this passes rest assured it’s not test scores that will go up, it’s those numbers
Sounds like KUSD needs to DOGE it up and cut some administrative fat, silly contracts, and clubs that have little to no practical educational value.