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Coming soon:

More info on how
schools spend money

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By Crystal Kua
Star-Bulletin

The Department of Education will soon be trotting out a new computer program intended to give expanded details on school-by-school spending.

The Hawaii School Expenditure Reporting System is supposed to answer criticism lodged by state auditor Marion Higa that the department doesn't give enough public information about how schools spend money.

In two previous audits, Higa has touted the computer program software called In$ite in recommending something like it for the department's financial reporting.

The department currently lists mandatory school-by-school expenditures on its Web site.

Higa said the department needs to go further.

She said it needs to tell the public how much money is being spent in the classroom, on teachers and on each student, along with other financial information.

Department officials told the Board of Education budget committee that the new software program it will be using is just as good as if not better than In$ite.

"I think what we've come up with is so much better," said board member Karen Knudsen, budget committee chairwoman.

Besides listing costs sorted by instruction, instructional support, operations, other commitments and leadership, the system will also provide information such as cost per pupil.

Board members also want information included with the reporting system to explain why expenditures may vary from school to school.

For example, a school with a higher per-pupil expenditure may have more senior teachers -- who have higher salaries -- than similar-size schools with a lesser per-student spending figure.