The Fredericksburg City School Board voted unanimously Monday evening to approve a Fiscal Year 2025-26 operating budget in the amount of $65.2 million, along with grants and a capital improvement budget.
No one spoke during the public hearing prior to the roll-call vote, but board member Malvina Rollins-Kay (Ward 4) asked for an update on how the loss of federal grants would affect the budget.
FCPS Chief Financial Officer Jen Brody told Kay that division staff are having “a lot of internal discussions on which actions we could take” and would return to the school board with an update in a couple of weeks.
A document provided to the Free Press by FCPS labels three federal grants or programs in red as a “significant concern” for FY26. Head Start ($1.6 million), school nutrition (CLOC revenue, $215,000) and Medicaid ($250,000) are classified as direct federal funding payments.
All other school nutrition ($2.53 million) is labeled orange, or “high concern” as funding that passes through the state, while forward-funded programs such as Title I ($1.33 million) and IDEA 611 ($821,000) as regarded as yellow, or “moderate concern.”
The school board also unanimously approved the 2025-26 instructional calendar, which includes more wiggle room for inclement weather than previously thought.
Chief Information Officer Mike George explained that the current year’s calendar included 1,064 instructional hours — a net plus of 74 hours beyond the 990 required by the state. To date, snow days have cost the division 48 hours of instructional time.
“We’re still very much clear for this year, unless there’s a major weather event that lasts more than four days,” said George, to which school board chair Matt Rowe (Ward 1) quipped: “Don’t jinx it.”
That context is important, George said, because next year’s calendar includes just 174 full days and two half days. The first day of school division-wide is Aug. 19, due to the opening of the new Walker-Grant Middle School and the transition of Gladys West Elementary School.
However, when going by instructional hours, the 2025-26 calendar still has a bank of 50 hours or eight days.
“Even if those weather events happen next year as they did this year, we would still be perfectly fine,” said George, who added that virtual learning days count as full days for the purpose of instructional hours.
A ‘little glitch’ impacting elementary school zoning process
While kindergarten registration for this fall is well underway with one more session scheduled, the school board has yet to vote on updated zones for each of the city’s three elementary schools.
School board member Molly McFadden (at-large) wants to know when they’ll have that opportunity.
“Are we ready to move forward?” McFadden asked during an update on the ongoing conversion of Gladys West Elementary School. “What month are we looking at that?”
In September, staff presented a draft of proposed zoning that took into account neighborhood continuity, demographics and student groups. Deputy Superintendent Matt Eberhardt explained Monday that staff met again last week to consider the zones, factoring in data from rising kindergarteners and eliminating fifth graders from the decision-making process.
“We discovered today that we have a little bit of a glitch with the SES, or poverty indicator,” Eberhardt said. “It doesn’t seem to be accurate… We understand the board is anxious — eager — to move forward, and we are as well. Hopefully, we’ll have something to bring back to you in April.”
