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One common thought that has been promoted within the Community Education world since the beginning of our first programs...try to meet all the needs of all the people all the time.

We all know that can't be done.

We currently meet with our advisory councils and analyze the demographic data and meet with many community groups, school groups and individual citizens to formulate the areas of need. We then identify resources available to meet those needs and attempt to use those resources to better our communities.

Chisago Lakes Community Education is continuing to evolve as the needs of our community members change. While the request to provide activities and events for infants to senior citizens increases, our programs for our school age youth take the majority of our time and resources. As the demand for all Community Education programming increases and the needs are many, the resources are fewer and fewer.

Funding for the Community Education program is provided by three major sources: local tax levy, state aid and fees. It is thought by some that Community Education makes a large profit from the fees that are collected. Actually, last year the Community Education budget ended the year with a $36,000 deficit. This resulted in spending $36,000 from our decreasing fund balance.

Many factors play into the resulting drop in revenue, including the current economy, increased expenses and flat state dollars over the past five years.

Sixty eight percent of the revenue collected by Community Education is generated by fees. In fact, for every dollar that the state provides we generate three dollars in services for our citizens. The Community Education Department and the Food Service Department are the only two departments within the school district that operate as a business, charging fees that generate dollars to offset the operation of those programs.

The Advisory Council and the Community Education staff are committed to keeping the cost of the programs we provide for students as low as possible. However, with the increase in our expenses and little or no increase in state funding, the unfortunate result may often be an increase in our fees. We still strive to keep fees as low as we possibly can but that challenge can not always be overcome.

Last year, Community Education offered over 250 youth activities with over 3,300 participants. Why do we provide this focus on youth? We believe that non-school hours represent a large amount of time that is discretionary for our youth. There is a positive impact on students who participate in high quality after-school programs, including improved academic achievement. After-school programs help to reduce youth crime and there is widespread public support for the expansion of these high quality activities.

If there is one thing that our Community Education staff has learned about meeting the needs of the community, it is that we can only do this by building good community partnerships...and good partnerships are based on good relationships. The uncertainty of our economy, and the harsh reality of increased gas prices, foreclosures and loss of jobs will only increase our need to work together to meet the many needs that will arise.

Together, can we be all things to all people?

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