Vermont is in the midst of one of the most consequential education reform efforts in decades. Under Act173/H.955, policymakers, educators, families and communities are grappling with how to redesign a system that serves approximately 80,000 students while stewarding significant public resources.
To put that in context: Vermont’s total state budget for fiscal years 2025-2026 is $9.1 billion. Of that, approximately $2.43 billion is dedicated to education spending. Few areas of public policy carry greater responsibility — or greater impact — than how we manage and deploy those dollars.
Yet amid debates about cost, consolidation, governance, and equity, a critical group of professionals is too often overlooked: the local school board members, district business managers, and finance directors who carry the fiduciary responsibility for this spending every single day. Many serve for modest compensation, not recognition, operating at the intersection of state policy, local governance, and community trust.
They are Vermont’s unsung heroes.
Across the state, members of the Vermont Association of School Business Officials (VASBO)—approximately 70 professionals statewide—do far more than simply “balance the books.” They build and revise budgets under shifting legislative requirements, manage labor contracts, oversee transportation and facilities, ensure compliance with state and federal law, and establish tuition rates not only for their own districts but, in many cases, for neighboring districts as well.
That work has only intensified.
In recent years, business managers have been asked to produce version after version of yield calculations, including no fewer than 13 documented iterations of long-term weighted average numbers, with final figures not resolved until December—only weeks before mid-January deadlines, when budgets must be finalized, printed, and prepared for public votes. As one frustrated but capable professional observed, “How difficult is it to count approximately 80,000 students?”
And yet, despite these challenges, the system continues to function — because these professionals make it function.
That reality raises an important question: Why wouldn’t we formally and intentionally include these experts in redesigning the system itself?
Too often, reform conversations focus narrowly on “What will it cost?” or “What will it save?” Those are important questions, but they are incomplete. The more meaningful question — the one Vermont must now confront — is: “What will it take?”
Here is one practical, low-cost proposal.
VASBO already meets monthly in Berlin, Vt. As part of Act173/H.955 implementation and ongoing education reform, the committees of jurisdiction could periodically attend one of these regular meetings using a fishbowl observation model — listening first, asking questions second, and learning directly from those who manage the system’s real-world complexity.
That conversation should also include representation from the auditing firm responsible for approximately 64 percent of Vermont school district audits. Importantly, that firm now employs several professionals who previously served as school business managers in Maine and were directly involved in Maine’s recent education governance reconstruction —individuals with firsthand experience navigating a transition strikingly similar to the one Vermont is now undertaking.
This is not about creating another task force, hiring additional consultants, or commissioning yet another report. It is about recognizing that the expertise already exists and that effective reform depends on engaging those who understand both policy intent and operational reality.
If Vermont is serious about sustainable and equitable education reform, we must elevate the voices of those who already carry fiduciary responsibility for more than $2.4 billion in public investment. They are not obstacles to reform — they are essential partners in making it work.
As Vermont moves forward, let us shift the question from “What will it cost?” to “What will it take?” And let us finally recognize, engage, and learn from Vermont’s unsung heroes.