Budget talks began in earnest Monday night at the North Shore Board of Education meeting at the high school. Superintendent Robert Root presented an overview of the budget discussions for the district. The tax rate for North Shore is sixth lowest of the 56 districts in Nassau County and allocates almost 70 percent of its budget to instruction, ranking it seventh in the county. The budget for 2002/2003 will concentrate on four main areas: maintaining educational programs; increased enrollment; long range plan for expansion and renovation; and the principal and interest payments on the $30 million construction bond.

The organization of the budget discussions this year will differ from previous years in that selected codes, or areas of expenditures, will be reviewed more extensively if they have significant impact on program and budget increase. Special projects, equipment and plant, staffing, special education, transportation, and designated fund balance will all be extensively analyzed due to their projected range of expense. Another change in format will be the separate discussion of the St. Christopher costs which will significantly increase due to the growth in the number of their students from 48 to 75.

The schedule for budget review is as follows: Feb. 26 - staffing, designated fund balance and revenue, March 2 - special projects, transportation, equipment and plant, administrative costs, March 11 - special education including St. Christopher and educational programs, March 18 - review, and April 9 - staffing.

The board also discussed the progress on the 2010 Curriculum Report that was presented in September. The faculty will work with the administration during Superintendent's Conference Day on some of the items suggested by the committee such as wording in the current code of conduct, the work of the newly formed curriculum advisory, committees, restructuring instructional time (such as using block scheduling in the high school), and continuous staff training in the use of technology.

There was unanimous approval of the teacher's contract and Dr. Root announced that there would be a district-wide letter going home describing three items from the contract that will affect the school schedule for the remainder of the year. The elementary school day will be extended by 15 minutes in the morning starting on March 4. The Spring Conference days will be full days on March 5 and March 13 with no half days, and the half day for elementary record keeping will be at the end of June and not on June 5 as previously scheduled.

The student government organization announced a T-shirt fundraiser will be held on Sports Night, Feb. 28, to encourage class unity. A student-faculty basketball game will be held on April 26 and the SGO is hoping to organize a conference at Hofstra with other schools to discuss student government issues.

Public comments concentrated on the issue of extra-curricular activities at North Shore. The board was urged to consider late busing for high school students who participate in after-school activities. Other districts in the area offer busing for their students who are part of late afternoon sports and clubs. Dr. Root agreed to look into the cost of added buses but reminded the audience that the district would be obligated to offer buses to all students from the district at area private schools as well, elevating the cost, perhaps prohibitively. The lack of athletic opportunities for students in the middle school was another concern and a petition with 50 names was submitted to the board asking for additional sports teams to be added to give more students access to playing on a team in seventh and eighth grade.

The next board of education meeting is on Tuesday, Feb. 26 at 8 p.m. in the high school.