Your kid, your money

What does the district spend on my kid?

$229 million divided by 8,100 students is a number nobody can use. This turns it into the one you can: what gets spent on a student like yours, and what a proposal on the agenda tonight would do to it.

Everything here is modeled from the district's adopted 2024–2025 operating budget, not from district per-pupil data. Only the district has that, which is exactly why I want them publishing this instead of me. That's the promise.

Source: Modeled from the East Brunswick Public Schools 2024–2025 adopted operating budget. These are aggregate public figures, not district-supplied per-student data, and nothing here is produced by district staff. See the sources and every assumption.

Step one

Set up your student

Nothing you enter is stored or sent anywhere. No name, no school, no account. The math runs in your browser and disappears when you close the tab.

Start from a student like yours

Grade level

Elementary (K–5)Bigger homerooms, one teacher, fewer specialists.Middle (6–8)Churchill or Hammarskjold. More staff per student than elementary.High school (9–12)Labs, electives, APs, athletics. The most expensive years by a wide margin.

What does your child use?

Check anything that applies. Leave it blank if none of it does.

Special education services or an IEPCase management, related services, and in some cases an out-of-district placement.ESL or multilingual supportESL staff time and translated communication.Rides the busRoute share, driver time, and fuel.Free or reduced-price lunchMostly federally reimbursed, but the district fronts staffing.Athletics, music, or clubsStipends, transport to games, equipment.

Your annual property tax bill (optional)

Used for arithmetic in your browser. It never leaves this page.

Modeled district spending

$27,706

per school year, for a student like this one.

Teachers in classrooms$11,058
Counselors, nurses & classroom aides$4,573
Special Education programs$4,150
Health insurance & pensions$3,739
Keeping the buildings running$2,202
Principals & central office$1,984

Step two

Board meeting mode

Built to be used on a phone from the back row while someone at the microphone says the cut is modest. Load what they proposed, or drag the lines yourself, and watch both halves at once: the dollars, and what the dollars do to a classroom.

Load a proposal

Or move the lines yourself

Classroom aides and paraprofessionals214 aides$0

Staffing holds where it is today.

Counselors and student support staff34 counselors (238 students each)$0

Caseloads stay near 238 students per counselor.

Bus routes62 routes$0

Every current stop keeps running.

Across-the-board staff raise0.0% raise$0

Current contract, no adjustment.

Supplies and materials per student$310 per student$0

Materials budget unchanged.

What this does to your kid

per year, on top of the $27,706 already spent on the student you set up above. New figure: $27,706.

Whole budget: $0
New total: $229,000,000
Typical household tax bill: $0

What actually changes

Nothing yet. Load a proposal or drag a line and this fills in with what it means in the buildings, not just what it costs.

Baseline is the 2024–2025 adopted $229 million operating budget. Unit costs are modeled averages, so treat the direction as solid and the decimal places as rough. Sources and assumptions.