Talbot County Public Schools officials told the Board of Education on Oct. 13 that new state rules under the Blueprint for Maryland's Future will require the district to show most program dollars are spent at the individual school level and that the district will pursue waivers where it cannot meet interim targets.

The district's finance lead, identified in the meeting packet as Ms. Jones (Talbot County Public Schools staff), said the state requires school-level spending equal to at least 75% of the program money attributed to a school and that the FY26 obligation is to show a 50% improvement from the FY25 baseline on programs that fell short. "We would have to demonstrate we'd spent at least 75% of that," Jones said, emphasizing the school-by-school accounting required under "pillar 5 of the Blueprint." She said the state expects full compliance by FY27.

Board members were shown county-by-county context and a district-level breakdown. Jones said the district examined its FY25 results and found 55 school-by-program data points (eight schools multiplied by the Blueprint programs); 36 of those were compliant and 19 were not. She described the current work as a tagging and accounting exercise: reviewing staff assignments and moving existing salary and expense entries between program codes so the same people and services are funded from the proper state program at the school where the students generating the funding are served.

Jones described next steps: a pre-meeting with the Accountability and Implementation Board (AIB) and a deeper data review with state and district staff later in the month, plus work by TCPS finance and teaching teams to reclassify positions where appropriate. She recommended applying for waivers this year for specific school-program shortfalls where the district does not expect to meet the FY26 improvement target, noting waivers defer but do not eliminate the state's requirement to reach compliance in later years.

Board members raised concerns about small schools and the equity of the approach. One member asked whether the per-student foundation dollars would cover the fixed costs of small schools such as Tillman, which a speaker described as having "only about 100 students" (approximate). Jones said the state allows a 25% flexibility from the school-level requirement and recognizes facility and staffing differences, but that the waiver process exists precisely because some schools and programs will need time to adjust. "They give us wiggle room," Jones said, but added waivers do not remove the obligation to be compliant the following year.

Several board members urged that the district seek additional state guidance and peer examples before finalizing any permanent coding changes. Jones said she preferred to wait for guidance from an upcoming statewide LEA AI/Blueprint conference and the AIB deep dive, then return policy and finance recommendations to the board's policy committee. She also asked the board to review the AIB waiver policy document attached to the meeting packet. "We're going to have to be mindful of this going into the '27 budget cycle," she said.

District staff said the work is primarily accounting and does not necessarily require new positions, although several board members urged the district to request state support for implementation staff. Jones said the district is moving staff-cost allocations in its current budget rather than adding headcount where possible, but that some districts have hired payroll or finance staff to manage similar exercises.

The board directed staff to continue the data review, prepare waiver requests where appropriate, and bring revised budget coding and public-facing summaries back to the next work session and to the Wednesday open meeting for any required votes.

For now, the district will pursue waivers where shortfalls are expected, continue internal re-tagging of staff and program costs, and prepare for full compliance work in the FY27 budget cycle.