The last day of September is a day when Michigan public school administrators want every student present to help determine the amount of state funding their district will receive, based on the number of students in classrooms. The higher the enrollment, the more state funding for their district.

This year, however, those administrators also are waiting for the state legislature to balance the 2009/10 fiscal-year state budget to see how school funding will be calculated. Michigan schools approve their preliminary budgets for a coming school year at the end of June, knowing that the state budget won't be approved for another three months. Administrators have to guess what their state funding will be and adjust their budgets accordingly the following October. As of Tuesday, October 6, the new state budget is yet to be approved and schools are facing a potential $218 cut in per-pupil funding.

For districts in the Eastern Upper Peninsula, that can mean at least tens of thousands of dollars lost in state education funding. Enrollment is up at a few EUP districts, while most are seeing slight declines from last year.

Les Cheneaux Community Schools and DeTour Area Schools are the only two districts with increased enrollments this fall. Les Cheneaux enrollment is up three students, to 314, and DeTour is up four, to 250 students.

St. Ignace Area Schools saw the biggest drop in students, decreasing by 40 students, to 636, this fall compared to last year. Engadine Consolidated Schools has the next biggest drop in enrollment, at 29 students, bringing its enrollment to 268. Districts like Mackinac Island Public Schools, Gros Cap School, and Pickford Public Schools are seeing a drop of one or two students each. Mackinac Island enrollment dropped one, to 77, Gros Cap dropped two, to 78, and Pickford dropped one, to 447 students.

"We've pretty much maintained the numbers we had last year," Pickford Superintendent Keith Krahnke said. If state lawmakers do cut perpupil funding, "we’ll probably take a hit, but it won’t be significant enough to alter what were going to do this year. We actually budgeted for a slight dip in pupils."

At Pickford, the per-pupil foundation allowance last year was $7,316, based on a blended count of students from the two previous years. If the proposed per-pupil cut is approved by the state, the district would stand to lose about $95,672.

Although their enrollments are down this fall, the Pickford and Engadine districts are the only two in the EUP with significant longterm enrollment growth over the last few years. Pickford's enrollment is up 18 students, from 429 students during the 2006/07 school year, and Engadine's enrollment is up 12 students, to 268 from that same school year. Engadine enrollment last year reached a high at 297 students.

Per-pupil funding in districts with steadily declining enrollments is calculated on a three-year average, which helps cushion the blow their revenue loss. Districts with increasing enrollments are calculated by adding 75% of the fall enrollment of the current school year with 25% of the previous year's winter enrollment count.

Larger districts see larger losses

Two of the region's larger districts, St. Ignace and Les Cheneaux, have been battling with declining enrollment for several years. Enrollment at Les Cheneaux Community Schools has declined steadily over the past five years, decreasing the student body by more than 100 students, and St. Ignace has seen a decrease of more than 200 students in that same time.

This year, enrollment at Les Cheneaux in Cedarville is 314, up three students from last year, making the districts three-year student average about 319. At the end of the 2008/09 school year, administrators at Les Cheneaux estimated their enrollment would be 292 students this fall, however, a combination of home-schooled students returning to public school for non-core classes, school-of-choice students, and new families who have moved to the area increased that number by 22 students. District officials attribute the increase to its promotional efforts to attract new students.

Along with the proposed $218 cut in per-pupil funding, state legislators are also discussing changing how per-pupil funding is averaged for districts with declining enrollment; keeping the three-year average or possibly moving to a twoyear average or no average at all.

Last year per-pupil funding at Les Cheneaux was $7,713. If the proposed cut is approved and the three-year average kept in place, Les Cheneaux could see about a $75,000 dip in state funding.

Superintendent Amy Scott said it's frustrating to balance her district's budget without knowing what state funding is going to be.

"For districts like us, there's a couple questions hanging out there," she said. "There's a lot of factors that we just don't know. It's very difficult [to budget threemonths ahead of the state]. We try to project as best as we can in these difficult financial times."

St. Ignace Area Schools has seen a much sharper decrease in students this decade, with total enrollment decreasing by about 200 over the last five years, Superintendent Mike Springsteen said. This fall, enrollment at the district is 636, down from 676 students last year and from 707 during the 2007/08 school year.

"We've taken some pretty big hits in enrollment. . . . It's been a pretty steady drop," he said. "I believe in addition to smaller numbers in families, I think some families are moving from the area."

The St. Ignace district has a three-year average of 673, and could see about a $146,000 drop in state funding.

Engadine Superintendent Angie McArthur said her district has allowed for a reduction in state funding in ts 2009/10 school year budget, anticipating the proposed per-pupil cut. Engadine adjusted its budget to be prepared for a $37,000 reduction in funding, however, if the proposed cut is approved, the district would see a reduction of $58,000 in state funding, she said.

"We budgeted knowing that perpupil funding was going to be reduced," she said.

The legislature changed its budget year from July 1 to October 1 back in the 1970s to fix a budget deficit, and has never changed it back, so it is out of sync with schools and most other agencies.

Ms. McArthur thinks the state needs to reexamine its budget schedule.

"We're a quarter of the [fiscal] year over and we still don't have numbers yet," she said.

Working with the October 1 deadline, legislators adopted an interim state budget October 1 to avoid a lengthy state government shut-down, buying themselves 30 more days to adopt the final budget.