Saturday, March 26, 2016

NBC4: Money Schools Earn From Student Portraits Varies Widely

The amounts of money local schools earn through the sale of student portraits varies widely, according to an investigation by the News4 I-Team.
Similar-sized schools, often within the same school district, are cutting demonstratively different contracts with photography vendors, causing disparities and potentially burdensome work for school principals.
The I-Team, through a review of school photography contacts in Virginia and Maryland, found some school principals cutting more lucrative deals than others. Some secured signing bonuses, while others negotiated more generous commissions. The I-Team found local school districts, which use school portraits as a fundraising tool for individual schools, allow individual school principals to make contract agreements with portrait photographers. Even within the same school district, those principals hire a series of a different photography companies, and are permitted to set their own prices for the pictures...



http://www.nbcwashington.com/investigations/Money-Schools-Earn-From-Student-Portraits-Varies-Widely-369744951.html

5 comments:

  1. I call these kickbacks! Words like "earn" further obscure what's really happening. And it looks like MCPS has violated MD ED 5-112(b)(1) and its own policy DJA by failing to follow fair, proper, and transparent procurement practices.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The I-team revelations
      Of the MCPS machinations
      Will trigger explanations
      With absurd obfuscations.

      Delete
  2. Nothing like making long lasting impressions.

    ReplyDelete
  3. $37,018 commission to Gaithersburg HS! And yet the IAF audit (http://apps.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/IndependentActivityFund/uploads/gaithersburghs/20151026_gaithersburghs.pdf) says that the Gaithersburg HS IAF is still in the red! Where is all the money going?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Great story. Parents are not given the choice of using a less expensive photographer and I at least was never told this was a 'fundraising' event.

    ReplyDelete

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