The views stated here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the editors of this newspaper. We welcome supporting or opposing views on any published item. Received July 9, 2026.
Regional School District 17 has lost 151 students in the past three years, not counting the ones we lost in this graduation year, 2026. This is a rough number since the audit still has not been approved. Haddam and Killingworth are two small, rural towns that have a lot of people on fixed incomes who just can’t dish out another $600 – $1000 more. The schools are getting to be like the government: too big. The Board of Education could get rid of a lot more positions.
Their May 5, 2026 request was for $54,465,593; the June 20, 2026 request went to $54,077,593; and now, for July 15, 2026, they still want $53,639,170! The BOE can still trim a lot more from this budget! We the people say: Enough. Go back to the drawing board.
Deborah Gifford, Haddam
Deborah Gifford is absolutely correct. The H-K budget request is too high. Why is this? It’s because Connecticut school districts have the 5th highest teacher salaries in the country combined with among the lowest student-teacher ratios. This combination produces the third highest property taxes in the country. The student-teacher ratio in H-K is 10.9 to 1, which is 28% below the national benchmark of 15.2 to 1, below which educational gains are statistically insignificant. This dynamic is understood by few taxpayers and parents, and conveniently ignored by teachers unions and their Democrat allies with whom they collude. Many of these parents simply assume, against the overwhelming evidence of more than 270 studies by education economists, that lowering sizes will produce higher achievement gains. This was true when class sizes were much higher, but no longer. When the ratio falls below 15.2 to 1, teacher effectiveness, quality curriculum, systematic phonics in the early grades, and school culture are far more important factors than lowering class sizes. Teachers unions will resist cutting teachers because each teacher cut deprives them of about $900.00 in annual dues they can use to fight budget battles and pay for those self-serving signs that say “protect our schools,” when the reality is that most of those higher budgets go to pay their higher salaries and benefits, and the union dues that are ultimately paid by taxpayers to finance their opponents in the budget battles. If the student-teacher ratio were raised to 15.2 to 1, it would mean an actual increase in actual class sizes by 3-4 students at most. This is a small price for already highly compensated teachers to pay to give taxpayers much needed and arrest the steady upward trend of property taxes that is unsustainable. The unions don’t care about taxpayers as long as they can extract their annual
pound of flesh. Time for a total recalibration of education finances to benefit long-suffering taxpayers, particularly those on fixed incomes.