{"id":804,"date":"2010-11-09T09:36:59","date_gmt":"2010-11-09T14:36:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unionvilletimes.com\/?p=804"},"modified":"2010-11-09T09:36:59","modified_gmt":"2010-11-09T14:36:59","slug":"formal-presentation-on-activity-fees-on-tap-monday-for-unionville-school-board","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=804","title":{"rendered":"Formal presentation on activity fees on tap Monday for Unionville school board"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Unionville<\/a>

Unionville High School baseball players and others involved in school activities may see some increases in activity fees for the 2011-12 school year.\u2014File photo.<\/p><\/div>\n

Research, conversations with coaches, athletes, families, taxpayers used to create picture of current status<\/span>
\nBy Mike McGann<\/strong>, Editor, UnionvilleTimes.com<\/em><\/span><\/span>
\nEAST MARLBOROUGH \u2014 A formal presentation on the topic of activity fees will be made next Monday during the monthly Unionville-Chadds Ford Board of Education meeting \u2014 as the district works toward creating a unified policy for such fees during the 2011-12 school year.<\/p>\n

Board member Jeff Leiser, who as chair of the board\u2019s communication committee has spearheaded the public input process on the fees proposal, noted with disappointment some recent published reports referring to the proposal as \u201cpay-to-play\u201d suggests that students paying fees would be entitled to playing time \u2014 he said it should be referred to as a participation fee.
\n
\n\u201cThis isn\u2019t a URA (Unionville Recreation Association) model,\u201d he said. \u201cThere\u2019s no obligation to get playing time.\u201d<\/p>\n

That having been said, the district has had a wide-ranging series of discussions with various groups, ranging from coaches to parents to players \u2014 and even taxpayers with no children in the district \u2014 to get a fuller sense of people\u2019s opinions, as well as a better snapshot of what those involved in activities are currently paying out.<\/p>\n

Although numbers and opinions from those conversations will be formally unveiled Monday night, a preview of that presentation was made during last Monday night\u2019s board work session.<\/p>\n

According to district director of student life Jim Fulginiti, a fairly clear picture has emerged: most don\u2019t want to see any cuts to existing programs and most are okay with paying modest increases to existing fees.<\/p>\n

The figures suggest that of 2,400 middle and high school students some 6,825 students per year participate in activities \u2014 the number being nearly three times the student population means that students are involved in multiple activities. Of those, a little more than half, 3,779 have fees associated, while 3,046 do not. The total cost of athletics and activities is $885,737, while existing fees raise $87,920.<\/p>\n

Most of the expenses come from athletics: Patton Middle School spends $197,000 yearly on sports teams, while Unionville High School spends $513,000 yearly.<\/p>\n

Fulginiti cited additional, optional spending by parents to buy specific items for their children as $281,773.<\/p>\n

Board member Holly Mazone asked whether all of the spending on items was needed \u00b1 and whether anyone was looking at what was being spent on what.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs all of this needed,\u201d she asked. \u201cIs anyone evaluating the necessity of these items?\u201d<\/p>\n

Fulginiti said that the process of what is needed versus what is merely wanted for participants is part of the evaluation process \u2014 with the idea that district would only pay for those items required, allowing parents and boosters to pay for frills at their discretion.<\/p>\n

The board is expected to take more public input on the subject \u2014 including at next Monday\u2019 board meeting and have a more formal proposal for the fee structure to be presented at the January board meeting, with the idea being that all numbers will be in place in time for the budgeting process for the 2011-12 school year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Research, conversations with coaches, athletes, families, taxpayers used to create picture of current status By Mike McGann, Editor, UnionvilleTimes.com EAST MARLBOROUGH \u2014 A formal presentation on the topic of activity fees will be made next Monday during the monthly Unionville-Chadds Ford Board of Education meeting \u2014 as the district works toward creating a unified policy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":805,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7,16],"tags":[118,117,39,119,7428,44,58,24,7427],"class_list":["post-804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","category-schools","tag-activity-fees","tag-athletic-fees","tag-chadds-ford","tag-participation-fees","tag-patton-middle-school","tag-school-board","tag-sports-2","tag-unionville","tag-unionville-high-school"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}