about me
The views and opinions expressed here don't necessarily reflect those of the Averill Park Central School District, nor its Board of Education.
I joined the Averill Park Board of Education 3 years ago because I loved our schools and wanted to ensure we would continue to deliver the best education our community could afford. My slogan was "smart financial decisions" because I have decades of experience running successful companies. I wanted to keep taxes as low as possible, while maintaining the quality of our education.
As I began to learn more about our school district, I began to gather data to analyze how we were performing - to some extent, looking at our return on investment by benchmarking AP against other similar districts - mostly in the Suburban Council. Over my brief tenure on the board, each year we would raise taxes and DECREASE the quality of our education, which didn't seem right.
I have come to realize that Averill Park is not being treated fairly by New York State. The root cause of many of our challenges is because we don't receive funding increases that are at (or above) the rate of inflation. Our State funding doesn't increase as costs increase, so we are forced to raise local taxes AND to cut teachers, administrators, and programs. The residents of Averill Park are paying more to get less and it hurts our kids.
I am hoping to raise awareness of this unfairness so that enough people in our district can put pressure on their elected representatives and give us our fair share of funding. If everyone invests 5 minutes to send emails, or 20 minutes to make calls, we will see some action. But we need a LOT of people to do this, and do it NOW.
Please tell your friends and neighbors. And do it now!
Thanks,
-Adam Stewart
