By a vote of 90-14 the House has approved a $208 million transfer from the School Aid Fund to community colleges as part of a plan to shore up the current year general fund shortfall.

Under the supplemental in HB 6086, the transfer would be considered a loan that would have to be paid back to the SAF "in subsequent fiscal years."

Technical Requirements

Pre-configuration Information
Below are the steps that you will need to follow in order to attend an Elluminate Live! session. You MUST follow these steps in advance of your first session.

Getting Ready

Despite getting all the state teacher unions on board and making other changes to the application, Michigan was once again not selected as a finalist to compete for federal grants to assist with education reforms.

Eighteen states and the District of Columbia made the list of "Race to the Top" finalists: Arizona, California, Colorado, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and South Carolina.

MASSP sponsors a program for new building administrators, a.k.a, Principals Boot Camp. Its purpose is to focus on the management side of principal leadership; the things that every school principal must handle to be an effective instructional leader.

We’re promoting camp registration. We think there will be a number of new assistant principals and first-time principals in middle school and high schools this fall. This is a special program to get them started with some "how-to's." The first Camp meeting – August 5th and 6th.

House Speaker Andy DILLON (D-Redford Twp.) confirmed moments ago that a deal has been reached on next year's School Aid Fund (SAF) that will mean an increase of $11 per pupil in the amount of state aid going to public schools.

The no-cuts budget for K-12 education will be laid out formally at 8 p.m. today as part of a joint House-Senate conference committee. Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Ron JELINEK told MIRS the conference report is being printed at this moment.

School districts, at least those representing Michigan Education Association members, would begin collecting an additional 3 percent of their employees' wages for retirement health system costs later this week, but the money would not go into the fund the state has designated for it under an order issued today.

I was outraged yesterday when the state media reported that Governor Granholm and House Speaker Dillon had joined with Senate Majority Leader Bishop in calling for the use of School Aid dollars to offset the state’s general fund deficit. The threat of the legislature raiding School Aid dollars is very real. We need all hands on deck now!

Officials are saying that the number of teachers and other school personnel who will take the early retirement option, authorized last month, is running about half what was initially hoped.

Eligible teachers and school personnel have until Friday to make a decision on taking the early retirement bonus option. So far, a spokesperson for Governor Jennifer Granholm said about 12,000 persons have done so.

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