Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Budget topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
School board directs staff to include free school lunch line and keep AP-exam pilot in FY 2026–27 budget
Summary
Board members told finance staff to keep an $80,000 AP-exam pilot, add a student free-lunch line (estimated $1.1M–$1.4M), and add three assistant principals and increased professional development in the FY 2026–27 budget; administrators agreed to provide a parental-leave cost estimate ahead of the Feb. 3 submission to the board of supervisors.
Montgomery County Public Schools board members on Jan. 28 directed staff to include several additions to the FY 2026–27 budget request before they submit it to the board of supervisors.
Angie Bland, the division’s director of finance, and Trevor Bennett, assistant director, answered members’ questions about line items and cost estimates. Bland confirmed the board’s direction to include a student free-lunch line and to keep an AP-exam pilot at $80,000. Bennett provided a range for the full cost of adding lunch at scale: "It's about 1,100,000.0," he said when asked for a ballpark figure; later in the discussion staff said estimates could be as high as $1.4 million depending on scope and participation.
Board discussion emphasized equity and trade-offs. Several members supported keeping an $80,000 pilot for AP exams that would cover a limited number of tests; administrators said covering every AP exam countywide would be closer to $180,000. Other members raised equity concerns that paying some exam fees without additional outreach or preparation could advantage students already positioned to take AP courses.
On staffing, board members asked administration to add three assistant principals to support Falling Branch, Auburn and Price’s Fork elementary schools — staff estimated additional personnel costs around $350,000. Members also agreed to raise the professional development allocation by $25,000 (from an existing $50,000 to $75,000) to support districtwide training and possible bilingual professional development for social workers.
Other budget items discussed included travel and textbook increases: Bland and other administrators said a roughly $80,000 increase in travel funds would allow more teachers to attend professional development, and they attributed about a $400,000 rise in the textbooks line to recent large adoptions and subscription renewals. The board asked staff to return with a cost estimate for paid parental leave for employees before the next meeting.
No final appropriation was adopted; the board provided direction for what the budget request to the board of supervisors will include and set expectations for staff to supply more precise cost figures ahead of the Feb. 3 vote at the supervisors’ first-reading meeting.
