Final Henrico Schools budget adds more elementary staff and teacher planning time

The Henrico School Board approved an $881 million budget for Fiscal Year 2024-2025 on April 18, including a $29 million addition from the Henrico Board of Supervisors.

The budget addition will add 73 new elementary staff positions and extend planning time for elementary teachers. The addition will also add 10 new pre-kindergarten teachers to provide art, music, and PE classes for preschoolers.

“It’s such a big win for our elementary staff,” said school board vice-chair and Tuckahoe District representative Marice Shea.

All elementary teachers will see their daily planning time extended, but the amount of guaranteed planning time will vary from school to school because principals will need to factor in enrollment and staffing when creating master schedules, according to Henrico Schools Communications Director Eileen Cox.

Funds from the board of supervisors also will provide all eligible HCPS staff with a 4.8% pay raise – the “highest across the board increase in the region” according to the school board – and extra pay increases for teachers and bus drivers that would total to a 7.2% raise.

“As you can see, the school board is committed to being a compensation leader and advocating for staff pay and a positive work culture,” Shea said.

Despite many complaints from support staff and other school employees, the extra pay increase still will only apply to licensed instructional staff. The extra pay increases are provided to staff positions that have critical vacancies, according to the school board and Henrico County Manager John Vithoulkas.

“The 7.2 that was not across the board,” Brookland District school board representative Kristi Kinsella said. “The board has received a lot of feedback about that. That was for critical shortage areas.”

The pay increase, along with a raise given to bus drivers this past March, also will boost bus driver starting pay to $25 an hour. The school board will consider pay readjustments for other positions on a continuing basis, Shea said. This past school year, both office assistants and exceptional education instructional assistants received raises after their positions were reclassified.

This year’s budget, which will take effect July 1, includes $63 million more than last year’s HCPS budget. Part of the increase will allow HCPS to fully fund 62 staff positions covered by a federal COVID relief grant, which expires in September, for the next two years, permanently adding several counselor, social worker, library assistant, and reading specialist positions to the general fund.

The finalized budget will add five new staff positions for the new Henrico CARES mental health program, four staff positions for the new Center for Innovation at John Rolfe Middle School, and 10 positions across the Advanced Career Education Centers.

HCPS is still waiting for Gov. Glenn Youngkin to sign the final state budget, HCPS Chief Financial Officer John Wack said, which could provide more funding to the current school budget.

The proposed state education budget for FY2025 would allocate $383 million to schools, and Youngkin’s proposal would add $5 million more to the budget, while the General Assembly’s proposal would add $25 million more. Youngkin will meet with the GA to vote on the final budget on May 15.

“We still need to see where the state budget lands. It may end up providing more state aid than is already included in our adopted budget,” Wack said. “But we are fortunate in that our general government counterparts have established our budget with enough local funds and the confidence level that the state aid’s going to be there.”

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The school board also approved the school calendar for the 2025-2026 academic year, which will have one joint first day for all grade levels, as has been the case traditionally. HCPS released a community survey in February that included a staggered start proposal for the 2025-2026 calendar, which would have had different grade levels starting school on different days, but the division ultimately decided against it.

HCPS leaders and community members will continue to discuss the staggered start proposal for future years, according to HCPS Chief of Staff Holly Coy. Results from the community survey indicated that a majority (56%) of HCPS parents, students, and staff supported a staggered start.

“That was the first time we laid out a specific proposal for HCPS,” Coy said. “We got good intel, but thought that we needed additional conversation, particularly with our teachers about how that plays out in schools and classrooms.”

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Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s Report for America Corps member and education reporter. Her position is dependent upon reader support; make a tax-deductible contribution to the Citizen through RFA here.