By David Fleet
Editor
Michigan Gov Gretchen. Whitmer formally adopted next year’s state budget on Sept. 30, one day before the start of the new financial year.
The $62.7 billion budget for 2021 includes a $65-per-pupil funding increase for school districts while cutting only $250 million from several agencies and programs. School districts statewide were concerned that a cut of around $500 per-pupil was possible due to the coronavirus.

However, area districts were spared any cuts to per pupil funding and provided a slight hike.
“These are one time unexpected dollars that we will use to help us fund our additional expenses due to offering both an in-person and at at-home virtual school model,” said Jan Meek, Brandon School district executive director of business services. “The Brandon School Board adopted a $500 per pupil reduction in June based on information at that time. The Governor’s budget is flat from last year so this is excellent news and will help us to cover the additional COVID-19 educational costs. We are anticipating a balanced budget for the 20-21 school year given the State budget as well as additional federal funding we have received.”
On Oct. 7 was student count day statewide. Count day has major financial implications for public schools. The recent October count represents 90 percent of the per-pupil funding while the February tally accounts for 10 percent. Each student represents about $8,100 in state allowance for the district.
“We will not know our final numbers for a few weeks but we are anticipating a flat student count which is better than our projections used for the budget adopted in June,” said Meek. “There is much more flexibility from the State on how to count virtual students; we can count via zoom logins, e-mail or a phone call from the teacher.”
Like Brandon the Goodrich School District was also anticipating a reduction in funding due to the pandemic for the 2020-2021 school year.
“It’s better than we anticipated,” said Wayne Wright, Goodrich School District superintendent regarding the budget. “We had planned for about $600 per students in cuts for this budget, a $1.6 million shortfall. We’ll be resetting the budget in November after we get student count which was Oct. 7. We’ll reallocate at that time.”
The Goodrich district has about 500 students learning at home and 1,600 in-person.
“Just some rough numbers we are going to be down about 100 students this year,” said Wright. “All but one district in the Genesee County Intermediate School District is down this year— most are down anywhere from 300 to 50 students.”