How do I prioritize a school budget when it makes no sense?

A school budget can look like a wall of numbers with no obvious handle. If it baffles you, that is not because you lack the sense for it. It is because no one ever showed you how to read it, and the format is built by people who already know it. Confusion here is a lack of a map, not a lack of ability. Start by ignoring the totals and asking one plain question: what does this money have to do for the children this year? List the must haves, the things learning cannot happen without. Then the should haves. Then the nice to haves. Suddenly the budget is not a mystery. It is just those three lists with prices attached, and prioritizing means funding the top list first. This week, sit with one trusted colleague and sort the biggest spending items into those three groups. You do not need to solve the whole thing. You need to see it in a shape you can reason about. Once the numbers become needs, ranked and named, the fear quiets and the work becomes decisions you can actually make.