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News Release
Texans for a Traditional School Year

For Immediate Release

For More Information Contact:
Tina Bruno @ 210-559-5277

Texas Schools Pay More to Cool Schools, Study Shows

Later start to school year could save millions for teachers, academic aid

(August 4, 2003) As students in the Keller Independent School District return to classes today, Texans for a Traditional School Year released data showing Texas school districts spend millions of dollars more to air condition schools for a portion of August than they spend during any full month of school.

Considering the funding crisis more and more schools across Texas are facing, Texans for a Traditional School Year (TTSY) called on school boards to review air conditioning costs, to refrain from requesting waivers to the state-mandated school start date, and to explore the potential cost savings of starting the school year even later.

TTSY Executive Director Tina Bruno pointed to the financial windfall realized by Oklahoma’s largest school district as an example. In July 2002, faced with a $17 million two-year budget deficit, the Tulsa school district pushed back the planned August 19 school start date to the day after Labor Day. District officials expected a $200,000 savings. Savings are now estimated to be at more than $1 million, said John Hamill, spokesman for Tulsa Public Schools. That’s enough money to hire an additional 20 to 40 teachers.

Hamill noted that the more than $1 million in savings for the 2002-03 school year resulted from an overall crackdown on wasteful energy usage, such as turning off lights in empty classrooms.

“There’s no doubt that not holding class during the hottest month of the year made a big difference,” Hamill said. “We have saved a goodly amount of money this year by starting school two weeks later than we had been and through routine energy conservation awareness.”

Texans for a Traditional School Year surveyed school districts across Texas about their utility bills for 2001 and 2002. The results showed that the 40 school districts that responded could have realized a total savings of more than $5.7 million.

Larger school districts paid as much as $551,000 more for August energy costs than they did in May. The Texas State Comptroller issued a special report in December 2000 that found that the “present structure of the school year may also be costing the districts as much as $10 million in higher cooling costs each year.”

Motivated in part by the promise of lower school utility bills, the Texas Legislature passed a law in 2001 requiring that schools start school no later than the week of August 21, unless there was clear community support for a later school start date.

But Bruno noted that schools could save even more money by starting school a little later, instead of beginning classes when energy demands are the greatest – and the most expensive. A later school start date and fewer breaks during the year would save money that could put teachers into classrooms and provide greater academic assistance to students in need, she said.

“I have yet to see a study or hear anyone argue that starting school in early August produces higher academic gains. That credit belongs to our teachers and the one-on-one services school districts are able to provide,” Bruno said. “It's simply a waste of money to start school in August. We must demand better stewardship of our tax dollars – for the sake of our children's education.”

At the very least, Bruno said, districts should follow the state-mandated school start date. Although more than 90 percent of all Texas school districts followed the state-mandated start date when the law went into effect last September, more districts are seeking waivers to start school earlier, including some of the state’s largest which, Bruno noted, have the most to lose by starting school early.

“At the same time these districts are asking for waivers, they point fingers at state education funding formulas and talk about needing more money,” Bruno said. “School board members say they want local control, but our data collection clearly shows that many school board members are not paying attention and our kids are hurting because of it.”

Texas could provide increased services to at least 23,000 students based on the Comptroller’s estimate, using a formula that the Northside Independent School District in San Antonio created to pay retired teachers to provide small group tutoring for children performing below grade level.

The number of students actually served through small group assistance would likely be much greater, Bruno said. “Students could be caught up before they fell too far behind, then another student could take their place. I estimate $10 million could serve more than 100,000 students in small group tutoring.”

People like Sandi Desbrow have no doubt the money could make a major difference in children’s lives.

“Money spent on this kind of very personal tutoring for kids pays off in so many ways,”
said Desbrow, a retired 30-year teacher who took part in the Northside ISD tutoring program. “The more one-on-one assistance you give a child early on, the better they will do in school later on.”

The early school start date costs money and has had no measurable impact on improved student performance, as Bruno noted by pointing to the recently released American College Test exam scores.

According to the web site of the American College Test, one of the nation’s most widely used college entrance exams, students in only seven states earned average composite scores of 22 or better on the 2002 ACT Exam. None of the other 43 states earned a higher composite score. Most of the seven top-scoring states administer mid-term exams after the winter break and begin school in the later part of August or early September.

In Tulsa, the September school start date didn’t seem to hurt preparation for that state’s standardized exam. “We didn’t see an appreciable slippage of state test scores in our district,” Hamill said.

Of the 40 Texas districts that submitted a completed respond to the TTSY survey, only two would not have realized any savings by moving the school year to the start of September. For the 38 other districts, cost savings ranged from $72 in the tiny Hooks ISD to $551,000 in the Pasadena ISD. Nearly half of the school districts surveyed, 19, would have realized savings of $80,000 or more.

“We read every day about educational services being cut; teachers being laid off. But we have yet to read about school districts pushing back the start of school to save money on air conditioning – freeing up additional funds for student instruction,” Bruno said.

What’s more, Bruno said, TTSY researchers believe the actual savings trend could be much higher.

“July and August are the most expensive months to cool a building. We simply compared the cooling costs of August verses May,” she said. “If a district removed a few holidays in the cooler months, the savings could be much greater.”

July and August are by far the hottest around the state, according to data provided by RAND Texas regarding Texas weather statistics. All of Texas’ 171 weather stations reported July and August as the largest energy consumption months.

Energy expert Luis de la Garza of San Antonio-based TEXEN Power Company said the real focus should be on cooling degree days. Cooling degree days show the demand for fuel to cool a building. “Minimizing use during the hottest months would indeed help school districts reduce energy costs. They could also maximize usage during cooler months and realize a much greater savings,” de la Garza said.

Also, school administrators should be prepared for a shock when the electric bill arrives in the next few months. Utility rates are expected to jump as high as 30 percent from last year in parts of the state due to rising natural gas prices and continued inactivity at one of the two nuclear power plants of the South Texas Project, which has provided cheaper alternative fuel to many utility companies.

Bruno said electricity bill sticker shock should give school officials another reason to consider starting school around Labor Day.

“Texas needs more money to educate our children, and we believe this relatively simple suggestion will provide much-needed dollars while having absolutely no negative impact in the classroom,” Bruno said.

Lower bills aren’t the only financial incentive for schools. TTSY released a study of state data in March showing that 60 percent more Texas public school children were present on the first day of class this school year versus three years ago. The dramatic spike in attendance numbers, which analysts credit to the later school start date, benefits school districts financially, since the state’s education funding formula is heavily based on average daily attendance.

The push for a later school start date in Texas also has overwhelming support from Texans. According to a 1999 survey of 1,000 Texans by the Scripps-Howard Texas Poll, 77 percent of the state’s residents favor a late August or early September school start date.

“Despite the fact that most parents want it – so much so that they pushed through a law to keep school from starting in the middle of the summer – some school administrators and school boards are resisting the growing trend toward a later school start date,” Bruno said. “If the educational and personal cost to students and families won’t change their minds, maybe the financial reality will finally be enough to get Texas back to a sensible calendar.”