EVERY administrator in the Brandywine School District earns six figures

EVERY administrator in the Brandywine School District earns six figures.  The average salary in Delaware (government, private, non-profit, all earnings) is about $62,000.  That means that almost every administrator in this school district earns double, and most earn more than double the average Delawarean's salary.

Makes you wonder how these people can be paid so much and fail so badly.  Test scores have been poor for years.  They look at it as a success if the proficient percentage goes up.  In other words, if last year, 50% of kids could read at grade level, and this year, 52% of kids could read at grade level, they made progress.  They see this as a success.

Before Mark Holodick was superintendent, there were no assistant superintendents.  Holodick made TWO assistant superintendent positions (and filled them with his buddies - at a MAJOR cost to taxpayers). He also grew the number of administrators in the district (One of them had been seen at least one Wednesday afternoon on a gold course instead of being at work and another attended the Penn Relays in Phila instead of being at work).  Holodick is now being considered to follow Susan Bunting as the head of the Department of Education for the state.

Last time the district asked taxpayers to fund (referendum) the school district (8 million more!), it failed the first time.  They get two shots at it, and it passed the second time.  They got the union and kids involved.  They told kids that if the referendum didn't pass, they would lose their music and art classes.  They told kids to share that with their parents. 

My suggestion was that every administrator donate 10% of their (large) salary, and that would reduce the amount they asked of taxpayers by 1 million dollars.  You can imagine the reaction to that suggestion! 

The last legislative session, they tried to pass a bill that would cut out the referendum process and be funded by the state directly (and the state would collect the taxes from us).  That bill got defeated, but watch for them to bring it up again.  How convenient - get more from taxpayers without going to the taxpayers directly!