Essay on "How a School Budget Is Designed"

Essay 5 pages (1488 words) Sources: 3

[EXCERPT] . . . .

School Budget Is Designed

The Trenton Public Schools are the New Jersey comprehensive community public school District that serves students in pre-kindergarten. In Mercer County in New Jersey, the Trenton public school consists of 16 elementary schools, two middle schools as well as the high schools. The district is one of the 31 Abbott districts in the New Jersey generally referred as "SDA Districts" based on its requirements for the state to cover the costs of renovation and school building under the general supervision of New Jersey Schools Development Authority. In accordance with the "New Jersey Administrative Code (N.J.A.C. 6A:23-2.1 et seq.)," the New Jersey school districts presents financial budget in accordance with GAPP (generally accepted accounting principles). (State of New Jersey, 2008 Pi).

Objective of this report is to present the method that Trenton Public School district in New Jersey designs its budget.

Method Trenton Public School District Designs its Budget

The budget of the New Jersey Trenton Public School district is designed in accordance with GAAP accounting protocols. GAAP is a common set of accounting standards, principles and procedures that organizations use to compile and present their financial statements. In the United States, GAAP set the common accepted guidelines that organizations use to compile and record their accounting information. Under the New Jersey Administrative Code, each district maintains a uniform financial recording, which is consistence with GAAP accounting system. (Ernest & Young, 2012).The Trenton Public School district's classification of accounts and financial reporting structure are in accordance with GAAP, and the Trenton Public school district accounting classifications are as follows:

Funds,

Expenditure,

Revenue,

Program and Project/Report,

Balance Sheet accounts,

Miscellaneous Accounts and,

County Vocational & Special Services School District Accounts. (State of New Jersey, 2008).

The dimension of the school district accounting classification is presented in the table below.

Revenues

Expenditures

Balance Sheet

Fund

Revenue,

Program and Project / Report,

Location

Fund

Program & Project/Reporting

Function

Object

Location

Fund

Balance Sheet Account

The coding financial structures of the accounting applicable to each dimension are shown in the table below.

Revenues

Fund

Revenue Source

Program and Project/Reporting

Location

xxx xxx xxx

Expenditure

Fund

Program and Project/Reporting

Function

Object

Location

xxx xxx xxxx xxx

Balance Sheet

Fund

Balance Sheet Account

xxx xxx

The summary of the School district budgeted for the 2013 fiscal year is presented below.

Mersey County 2013 School District Budget

Revenue

Local Funding

$901,000

State Funding

$7, 789,000

Federal Funding

$1, 090,000

Total District Funding

$9,780,000

Expenditure

Salaries Expense

$4,495,000

Employee Benefits Expense

$1,501,000

Capital Outlay Expense

$172,000

Non-Elementary and Secondary Expense

$0

Total District Expenditure

$9,040,000

Percentages of the school district revenue sources for the 2011-2012 budget is as follows.

Revenue Sources, State: 86.5%

Revenue Sources, Local Taxes: 7.5%

Revenue Sources, Federal: 6%

Revenue Sources, Tuition: 0%

Revenue Sources, Use of Fund Balance: 0%

Revenue Sources, Other: 0%

2. Superintendent's and School Board's Responsibilities for Building a Budget

The budget for the school district is based upon the goals and policies of the Board, which is developed by the Superintendent .The superintendent and school board in accordance with the New Jersey law must prescribe a uniform double-entry system of bookkeeping for the Trenton school district. Typically, school board and superintendents are to implement ethical accounting practice for the school district, and they must ensure that the budgeting system is in accordance with the GAAP protocol. Moreover, all funds must be verified properly before they are dispersed, and Superintendents have special functions to oversee that precise records are kept to maintain proper bookkeeping. The primary role of school board and superintendents are to maintain a healthy school budget. A superintendent should always figure out how to spend money, and when it comes to school accounting, superintendents should oversee the budget of all districts. Typically, superintendents could reject certain segment of school's expenditure that is not in accordance with the law. Moreover, superintendents can also veto budgets if the budget includes unwarranted non-instructional costs, and superintendents must approve all aspects of budget before it is made public.

More importantly, it is the responsibility of the executive county superintendent to review and approve the budget before it is made public. The review will include the verification to ensure that the budget should be able to deliver the skills and knowledge to all students and students should be able to derive CCSS (Common Core State Standards) and NJCCC (New Jersey's Core Curriculum Content Standards) from the base budget.

The superintendents have the… READ MORE

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