AUSD Compensation Project: Records Request Sent to School District

Last week, Albany Patch told readers , and the compensation of officials, in the .

With the state financial crisis continuing to impact schools throughout California, the issue of .

We intend to take an unbiased look at district compensation, how it affects the overall budget, and how it can affect teacher retention as well as other issues in the classroom.

Asked one reader: "If AUSD is asked to maintain high standards, what realistically are they going to have to pay for it?"

We're not sure if we'll be able to find answers, but we'll do our best to explore the questions that are most important to you.

As part of this investigation, Albany Patch submitted a public records request to the school district on Thursday.

Here's what we asked to see:

1. Total cost of employment for the superintendent and assistant superintendent 
2. Average teacher salary, 2011-12
3. Current contract between the Albany Teachers Association and AUSD 
4. Number of teachers in each step/column of the ATA salary schedule (2012-13)
5. Number of new teachers hired for 2011-12
6. Number of people for whom the district pays full retiree health benefits, and the total cost of those benefits (2007-2012)
7. Total number of teachers employed by AUSD, and the FTE, 2011-12 
8. Cost of teacher health benefits—broken into the base premium for each insurance plan, the number of individuals enrolled in each plan, and the total amount paid by the district for each type of insurance plan (2007-2012)
9. The cost of health benefits for each school board member (2007-2012)

This information—in addition to interviews with teachers and district officials—will ideally give us a more complete picture of the topic of compensation in the Albany Unified School District.

As before, we want to hear from you. We received numerous comments after last week's post, and hope you'll keep it coming; your feedback will help fuel a fair and fruitful investigation. 

As we continue interviewing sources and sorting through statistics, we intend to give regular updates of our progress.

UP NEXT: We'll share highlights from a recent interview with Albany Teachers Association negotiation chair Loring Barker.

Share your questions, suggestions and opinions in this story's comment section, or send us an email at albany@patch.com. Read more about the school budget here.

If there's something in this article you think , or if something else is amiss, call editor Emilie Raguso at 510-459-8325 or email her at albany@patch.com.