Per-Pupil Costs in Brick Trail State Average

State data on school districts released late last week shows Brick trailed the state average in per-pupil costs.

For the 2010-11 school year, the year for which data was recently released, Brick spent a total of $14,733 per student, about $3,000 below the state average of $17,469.

The total cost per pupil includes services such as transportation, as well as the cost of private school tuition for special education students and certain facilities costs that were not included in state "report cards" released in previous years. This year's report card recalculated previous annual data based on the new standards.

Teacher salaries and benefits added up to a lower percentage of the total budget last year, at 53 percent, down from 59 percent in the two years prior. The state average is 57 percent.

Administrative salaries and benefits last year totaled 8 percent of the budget, short 1 percent of the state average of 9 percent. The 8 percent figure has now held steady for the previous three school years.

Local taxpayers funded 67 percent of the school district's costs through property taxes, higher than the state average of 52 percent, while the state funded 29 percent of the school budget. Federal aid accounted for 5 percent of the total. Generally, the local tapayers' share of district costs rises as state aid drops under the state's school funding formula.

Faculty members, on average, earned $58,250 in Brick last year, up from $54,830 the year before, but less than the state average of $63,851. Administrators earned $119,791 on average last year, on par with the state's average administrator salary of $119,491. Administrator salaries rose from an average of $115,123 the prior year, and $110,843 during the 2008-09 school year.