There have been challenges on the financial front thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, and there will be challenges as they move forward, but to date, the South East Cornerstone Public School Division is meeting funding challenges head on and with some success.
With the first quarter report now registered, Cornerstone board members received a first-hand review of the financial picture by finance manager Marilyn Yurkiw on Dec. 16 during their monthly public board meeting.
Yurkiw provided the numbers online while the majority of board members also received them in the same manner as the meeting took on a virtual and on-site mixture to end the calendar year.
“Ministry grants are not being adjusted for enrolment changes this year,” Yurkiw said, noting that contingency funding has replaced that exercise for this pandemic fiscal year.
The operations budget showed a first quarter surplus of $1.547 million with Ministry of Education grants showing up as $27.8 million and projected to be $3.02 million higher than budget due to additional funding received for costs related to COVID-19.
Total operating grants amounted to $25.536 million while capital grants were just under $2.23 million.
Yurkiw predicted that tuition fees will be $234,000 lower this year and currently stood at $172,000 for the first quarter.
School generated funds are also expected to be lower than budget by the end of the school year due to COVID-19.
Governance and administration expenses at $52,000 and just under $777,000 respectively, are pretty well on track while instruction expenses, which take up about 65 per cent of the budget, will probably be over budget by about $1.7 million by fiscal year-end, she said. That too, will be due to the challenges brought about by the pandemic.
Plant operations and maintenance are also expected to be over budget by $1.25 million since the division was required to bring in additional janitorial and maintenance staff to ensure even cleaner and safer schools. She noted that transportation costs might also be elevated for the same reasons – more frequent and deeper cleaning exercises.
That could hike transportation costs by about $88,000 she said.
On the overall scale, Yurkiw said there could be an increase in revenue of $2.787 million that will be more than matched by an overall increase in expenses of $3.02 million.
