School budget adds 9.5 teaching positions
Albany schools will see few changes from the current year under the proposed budget for 2012-2013, but it calls for a few more teaching jobs because of expected higher enrollment.
Public input will be taken on the budget at the next meeting of the Greater Albany Public Schools budget committee, 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 16, at the district office, 718 Seventh Ave. S.W.
The committee is expected to approve the budget at its meeting May 23. A budget hearing will be held June 11, and the Albany School Board is scheduled to vote to adopt the budget at its June 25 meeting.
Superintendent Maria Delapoer is proposing a general fund of $69,457,416, up about $340,000 from the current year’s fund of $69,119,610.
Various line items fluctuate throughout the budget document, but the biggest change is probably 9.5 additional teaching positions, Business Director Russell Allen said. Most of those are because of expected enrollment growth.
Administrative and classified positions are expected to remain the same.
The district also plans about $200,000 in capital improvement projects, including portions of roofs at Calapooia Middle School and Lafayette Elementary School and some heating and ventilation work at South Shore Elementary School, Allen said.
Other line items to receive a boost include $20,000 to pay coach stipends to continue middle school track and slight increases to summer school and Saturday school programs for struggling students.
Volunteers have agreed to run the meets, which saves the district thousands of dollars, Allen said.
State revenue continues to drop, to the tune of approximately $950,000 less to Albany next year than this year, Allen said.
Cost-saving efforts put in place last year will continue. Fir Grove and Fairmount schools will remain closed and employees have agreed to five furlough days: three student instruction days and two non-contact days, including a paid holiday.
The district agreed to restore employee pay for the holiday if the ending fund balance reaches 11 percent or more of the total. That happened this year and is likely to happen again, Allen said.
The entire budget is available for viewing online at www.albany.k12.or.us.
Tigard-Tualatin schools put 27 teaching jobs on the chopping block
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District leaders say positions will likely go unfilled as employees retire
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Tigard-Tualatin School District officials have identified where $2 million in reductions will be next year, and it will likely be cutting teaching positions.
In all, 27 jobs face the chopping block under a proposed budget that went before the district’s Budget Committee Wednesday night.
Under the proposed plan, 23.5 teaching positions would be cut, as well as administrators and classified staff. Class sizes in elementary schools are expected to grow as well.
Most of the cuts will likely be absorbed through normal retirements and attrition, said district spokeswoman Susan Stark Haydon.
So far, more than 22 people in the district announced their retirement, and another 32 will leave the district through attrition, Stark Haydon said.
“We should be pretty close with just retirements and resignations,” she said. “There are some positions that we will have to rehire, depending on what class they taught.”
Last month Superintendent Rob Saxton said the district would have to cut about $2 million from its budget next year to help grapple with its local option levy shortfall, which is expected to bring in only half as much as it did this year.
The district is looking at about a $1 million drop this year and next year in the levy, which taxes properties in the district on the difference between their assessed value and real market value. The local option levy tax rate is $1 per $1,000.
In many cases, the market value of a home has dropped so much there is not much of a gap to apply the tax to, Stark Haydon said.
The amount the levy has collected over the years has dropped dramatically due to the down economy.
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Budget proposal may save teaching jobs
Budget proposal may save teaching jobs
Published 6:31pm Tuesday, May 8, 2012
A budget proposed by the House Budget Committee Tuesday afternoon could save hundreds of teachers’ jobs across Alabama.
House budget committee Chairman Jay Love Tuesday introduced an education budget that would cut fewer teachers’ jobs than the one already passed by the Alabama Senate.
The representative from Montgomery outlined his proposal for the Ways and Means-Education Committee Tuesday and the committee is expected to vote on the budget Wednesday.
The full State House could consider it Thursday.
“Of the possibilities, this one is certainly the best,” Demopolis Superintendent of Education Dr. Al Griffin said of the proposed budgets. “None of them are great, but this one is the best.”
The Senate’s version of the $5.5 billion education budget for the 2012-2013 school year is approximately $150 million lighter than this year’s budget and called for the likely elimination of more than 600 teaching positions for the coming school year.
Love’s proposal puts expected job losses at about 350.
Love’s budget calls for a $30 million bond issue to purchase buses, which would allow lawmakers to free up $20 million of its current revenue, which was originally earmarked to fund the purchase.
However, even under Love’s proposal, class size would still continue to grow.
Gov. Robert Bentley proposed a budget in February that eliminated more than 1,000 teachers and added 0.5 students per classroom. The Senate killed that proposal but countered with a version that reduced the increase to 0.4 students per classroom.
Love’s proposal trims that figure even further to an increase of 0.135 students.
“We can absorb that,” Griffin said of the increase and loss of funding. “We would take that divisor increase and not eliminate any jobs. We could fund that locally.”
Under the Senate’s budget, Demopolis City Schools would likely lose more than $47,000 in other current expense funding, which would force administrators to look at how to offset that locally. Under Love’s plan, the school system would lose approximately $15,000, which Griffin said the system could weather.
City, Schools And Teachers Join In Effort To Save Jobs
Portland city leaders are in talks with leaders at Portland Public Schools, and the teachers’ union, in an effort to avoid cutting 110 teaching positions.
The Portland Association of Teachers sent a message to members saying the union has been “intensely working for five straight days with the district.”
Portland Public Schools’ spokesman Matt Shelby says city leaders also are involved in a united effort to keep the district from laying off teachers this spring.
“It’s kind of a joint brainstorm for ‘who can do what’ to help limit those cuts to the schools. And so we’re making progress there. We’re happy with that. We don’t have a ‘done deal’ yet,” Shelby says.
The district’s proposed budget recovers more than $10 million of its $27 million shortfall by cutting teachers.
Superintendent Carole Smith has asked the union to help restore teaching jobs by accepting unpaid furlough days. The union has told the district to look into cutting more than the 34 administrative jobs cut in the proposed budget.
Portland Plans To Save 110 Teaching Jobs
Posted: Friday, May 4, 2012 6:12 am
The Chronicle
Portland Public Schools learned Thursday that the city plans to cover nearly one-fifth of the district’s budget shortfall to help save 110 teaching positions.
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Portland Plans To Save 110 Teaching Jobs
Portland Public Schools learned Thursday that the city plans to cover nearly one-fifth of the district’s budget shortfall to help save 110 teaching positions.
Mayor Sam Adams called in his finance officials, as you’d expect for a city budget announcement. But he had special guests, too: superintendents from two city school districts: Carole Smith with Portland Public and Don Grotting from David Douglas. Adams told them the city should support the progress they’re making.
Adams explained, “Now is not the time to reduce the teaching staff of our schools, and lose this momentum. So we have ‘overcut’ the city’s budget in places, to come up with $7 million, about $7.5 million in one-time resources.”
Portland Public gets $5 million. That’s roughly half of what it’ll cost the district to avoid cutting 110 teaching jobs. The city struck a deal with the district and teachers’ union to make up the rest. Superintendent Carole Smith says she’s planning to cut beyond the nine million in administrative cuts she had already proposed.
Smith said, “Our principals will be looking at a three-day furlough — so school-based staff, three-day furlough. And our central office is looking at a ten-day furlough, as a portion of how we are going to cover our two-point-six-five million dollar portion of the deal.”
For weeks, the teachers’ union has balked at accepting furlough days, in part to pressure Smith to make deeper administrative cuts. The president of the Portland Association of Teachers, Gwen Sullivan, didn’t say how her members would help fill the remaining gap now. The deal for Portland Public needs support from the union, from the Portland school board, and the city council to hang together.
Other Portland districts haven’t been asked to make concessions in exchange for city money. Superintendent Don Grotting says David Douglas has cut 16 percent of its teaching staff in the last two years.
Grotting said, “We just settled our contract, and our bargaining unit made over — both bargaining units made over one million dollars in concessions of benefits they will not receive.”
Adams’ final budget as mayor focused on “direct services.” In addition to teachers, it prioritizes police patrol officers and firefighters.
A big chunk of the 14 million dollars Adams proposes cutting comes from what he calls “back office” workers. The head of Management of Finance, Jack Graham, has a lot of those.
Graham said, “The cuts to core administrative services’ function are substantial. However, I feel that it is the right thing to do, to cut administration in order to provide direct services to our citizens.”
The budget plan would also hit Portlanders in the wallet. Adams proposes a rise of more than six percent on combined water and sewer bills. But he points out that’s a smaller increase than the bureaus requested.
All these pieces — the $7.5 million for schools, the utility rate increases, the cuts to city administration — are part of the city’s budget. It still needs approval from Portland city council.
Mayor’s New Budget Protects Teaching Jobs
There is good news for city schools in the executive budget that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg will unveil on Thursday, Gotham Schools reports.
As Chancellor Dennis M. Walcott had promised, the budget will not include cuts to schools, reversing a trend in the last several years of reductions that led to layoffs of support staff last year and a reduction in the teaching staff.
Under the new $68.7 billion budget, which the City Council has to approve by July 1, the size of the city’s teaching force will not be reduced through attrition — quitting, retirements, deaths or promotions.
It was a relief to many who had feared a further reduction of staff — and perhaps a continued rise in class sizes, Gotham reports.
In each of the last two years, the city has narrowly avoided teacher layoffs but has still seen the number of teaching positions drop because of attrition, last year by 1,800 spots. For next year, a hotly debated line in the mayor’s preliminary budget called for the city to leave about many teaching spots unfilled. The city pegged the reduction at about 1,100 positions, but City Council members said the real shortfall would have cost 2,500 jobs.
The Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, said council members tried to draw a line in the sand, Gotham reports: “In the Council’s budget response, we articulated very significant concern about the level of proposed attrition within the department of education,” Quinn said.
Gotham goes on to say:
The Council sources could not say whether deep cuts slated for after-school programs would be rolled back. Advocates have been pressing the city to restore some of the proposed after-school cuts, including with a barrage of phone calls this week, and are planning a rally on the steps of City Hall for moments after the executive budget presentation on Thursday.
But Michael Mulgrew, president of the United Federation of Teachers, reveled for the moment in the budget news related to teachers, Gotham Schools says: “We’ve lost thousands of teachers over the last three years to attrition, and class size is higher than it has been for decades. As the city stabilizes its teacher losses — and ideally starts hiring more — we should be able to start bringing those class sizes down.”
Education is likely to be a decisive issue in next year’s mayoral elections, and The New York Times is reporting that a high-profile — albeit controversial — figure in New York City education is seriously considering stepping into the ring.
Eva S. Moskowitz, leader of the Success Academy charter schools, has been mentioned by some city Republicans as their possible candidate. But Ms. Moskowitz has thoughts of her own:
Ms. Moskowitz said in an interview that she was still considering a bid for mayor and would decide in the next month or so, but that she would run as a Democrat. Among the factors that would determine her decision, she said, was whether any of the Democrats expected to run — Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker; Bill de Blasio, the public advocate; William C. Thompson Jr., a former city comptroller; and Scott M. Stringer, the Manhattan borough president — articulated what she considered strong policies on education.
“If a candidate came out really strongly in favor of reform, that would certainly influence my perspective,” she said.
Inside Schools reports that advocates for special education students are puzzled about the city’s decision to exempt 27 high schools next fall from new city rules that require schools to admit more special education students.
On the exemption list are elite schools like Bard, Baruch and Eleanor Roosevelt in Manhattan. More generally, Inside Schools reports:
The schools given exemptions fall into three categories: the city’s 14 International schools that serve new immigrants; seven schools that require auditions; and six hyper-competitive academically screened schools. (An additional nine specialized high schools, governed by state law, are also exempt.)
Maggie Moroff of Advocates for Children told Inside Schools: “It just doesn’t sit right. The D.O.E. has the same obligations to provide these schools with the support to meet all students’ needs.”
Besides the mayor’s budget announcement, here are some events related to education going on around the city on Thursday:
From 9:30 to 10:30 a.m., Public School 197 John B. Russwurm in Harlem will hold an event to promote healthy eating. Dr. Jeff Gardere, a TV personality, and Susie Q., a fitness expert, along with the Touro College Children’s Health Education Foundation, will help students “launch a citywide school-based initiative to teach their parents the value of substituting water for sugary beverages.” The school is at 2230 Fifth Avenue at 135th Street, Manhattan.
The Fiver Children’s Foundation, an organization that provides support and services to under-served city schoolchildren, will hold its 10th annual Fiver Benefit at Bridgewaters at the South Street Seaport. Current and former Fivers will be present and will partake in the program.
And, teachers, you are invited to a SchoolBook event on May 8 at the Greene Space/WNYC — a workshop on incorporating real-life events into the classroom. You can reserve a free ticket here and learn more about the topic under discussion from the Learning Network here and here.
Ten teaching jobs cut in Moon Area
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Ten teaching positions were eliminated in the Moon Area School District Monday in what directors are referring to as budgetary process.
“This motion will support program changes, reorganization and promote a more effective and efficient educational system,” wrote Megan Edwards, public relations officer, in a statement from the district Tuesday. “We value all of our employees and it is our hope that many, if not all, furloughs will be recalled.”
Written layoff notices will be sent by Monday to eight elementary teachers, a special education teacher and one teacher for business, computer and information technology. All have received oral notification.
Prior to the 5-1 vote, Tim Ford, Moon Education Association president, said he felt the decision was unnecessary due to the district’s $9 million fund balance and because taxes had not been raised in three years.
Mr. Ford said the furloughs would affect “excellent teachers and fine programs” and cautioned directors these layoffs would result in larger class sizes and would affect students negatively.
The teachers’ contract requires the district to provide a 60-day notice for a teacher furlough. The district was given a 15-day extension on this process, but it was denied an additional 30-day extension by the union. The additional extension would have allowed directors more time to finalize the budget to know if the furloughs will be needed.
According to directors, some or all of these cuts could be reversed once the district finalizes its 2012-2013 budget. The deadline is June 30. The school board is attempting to pass the budget without a tax increase for property owners in Crescent and Moon.
“We are fighting to not make this happen,” Director Laura Schisler said. “Just trust us, we’re working on it.”
The measure passed with Jerry Testa dissenting. Mike Olszewski, Denny Harbaugh and Sam Tranter were absent.
Residents and teachers spoke against the cuts prior to the vote.
“This makes us look bad by firing 10 teachers,” said Alicia Schooley, a Moon parent. “I know firsthand some of these teachers, and you’re losing some of the best.”
Meetings have been rescheduled for May 7 and May 21, when the preliminary budget is expected to be adopted.
Both meetings will be at 7 p.m. in the lower-level board conference room in the high school.
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High propagandize boiler, 4 teachers, diving manager and supports for training …
The 6 Clarkstown Board of Education curators during Thursday night’s bill seminar and assembly authorized a $180,931,141 budget for 2012-2103. They voted to supplement a new boiler for Clarkstown North High School annex, a diving manager for a float team, 4 additional training positions and $270,000 for training assistants. The combined expenditures of $1,089,000 will use income from a district’s unidentified haven funds.
The additions to a bill will not impact a taxation levy, that had been recalculated from 2.41 percent percent to 2.37 percent. Assistant Superintendent John LaNave pronounced they had reviewed a due bill with a state comptroller’s bureau and a taxation levy, that was revised to 2.37 percent, still falls within a dual percent skill taxation top since certain mandated equipment and services are free from a cap. It will not change a approaching skill taxation boost of $190 for a owners of a home with a marketplace value of $525,000 and assessed value of $160,000.
While house members voiced compensation with a revised budget, one comparison citizen was not pleased.
Joe Tarangule of New City said, “I’m revelation all my seniors to opinion it down. We were going to go with dual percent, not 2.3 percent.”
The boost of approximately $1.1 million from a strange bill will boost a volume of income being taken from pot to roughly $6 million. The bill initial due by a superintendent in Mar totaled $179,841,433.
Board members spent some-more than an hour going over a several equipment for that they had requested costs. Besides a authorized additions, they had asked about a prices for purchasing new buses and vans and employing a hockey coach.
They concluded fast to deputy a boiler during North. The district will accept state assist equaling 55 percent of a cost over a set volume of time.
After reserve concerns were lifted about a series of float group members and one manager to manipulate them, a house concluded to sinecure a diving manager during a cost of approximately $9,000.
“I’m really endangered about a swimming pool not carrying a diving coach,” pronounced house member Robert Carlucci. “There needs to be someone there who is competent.”
Board members went behind and onward over a need for reading teachers and how many reading specialists and training assistants to hire. Board Member Phil DeGaetano pronounced 1,000 facile propagandize students in a district are pulled out of their classes for reading assistance.
He review from a minute created by a Greg Montague, boss of a Clarkstown Teachers Association, that pronounced 22 percent of a staff felt there is a poignant need for “additional support in a area of reading. In fact, a staff recommends not only reading teachers though reading specialists with Special Education knowledge.”
Board Member Joe Malgieri pronounced he suspicion employing some-more training assistants to assistance teachers would be some-more profitable than employing reading teachers.
Superintendent Margaret Keller-Cogan told a house that a bill already supports set aside for training positions.
“We have 6 positions built in for contingency,” she said, observant that expected reductions in facile propagandize enrollment would supplement another 5 positions for a sum of 11.
Keller-Cogan endorsed putting in another 4 training positions bringing a series adult to 15. She suggested watchful until a information from a ELA tests now being taken by students is available. She pronounced that information could afterwards be used to brand what needs exist. Board authorisation would be indispensable before any of a 15 training positions could be filled.
$6.4 million was enclosed in a strange bill offer for training partner salaries and benefits. Malgieri due adding $270,000 for adult to 10 training partner positions.
“The house combined a poignant series of training positions in strait so there will be a sum of 15 teachers if we need to sinecure additional staff to support a alleviation efforts and also combined 10 training assistants,” pronounced Keller-Cogan.
The district’s bill contingency be submitted to a state by midnight tonight.
Keller-Cogan pronounced a bill is a good one.
“I consider it’s an unusually sound and defendable budget,” she said. “It’s going to accommodate a tyro enlightening needs.”
On May 15, electorate will expel ballots on a bill along with electing 3 members to a propagandize board. The bill contingency accept capitulation from 50 percent of those voting in sequence to pass. Six possibilities are using to offer three-year terms on a board.
Barberton school board cuts 28 teaching jobs
barberton: Budget concerns are forcing the Barberton Board of Education to eliminate 28 teaching positions.
The school board voted Monday night to make cuts that will save the district $2.5 million a year.
The exact number of teachers that will be laid off is not yet known as the district first must see how many teachers opt to retire or not return after this school year.
Board President Dennis Liddle told the 40 in attendance at Monday night’s meeting that the district has lost nearly $4 million because of federal and state budget cuts, coupled with a 20 percent decline in real-estate tax values.
Liddle said the board reviewed every option and worked to save some teaching jobs through other cuts.
“We have the unique ability to reinvent the traditional structure of district leadership and right-size the district’s activities,” he said. “We have worked with the state legislature to create this model and there is language in the midyear budget review to support our new structure.”
Layoffs, if needed, will be done by seniority and job classification.
The cuts among teachers will save about $1 million. The district has already factored in nine retirees to save an additional $720,000.
Eight administrator positions will be eliminated or reorganized, including one elementary principal returning to the classroom because there will be one fewer school buildings next year. An assistant superintendent position will not be filled. These changes are expected to save $412,000.
Four people — two maintenance workers, a utility person and a custodian — will not be replaced after they retire this year, saving another $240,000.
Board member Maggie Masson cried over the decision.
She said the vote was particularly hard for her as she was a teacher for 37 years and was laid off twice during her tenure.
Masson said that compared to other districts, Barberton is getting a good return from its investment in its administrators, who are taking on additional duties that are not the norm.
The board also voted to name Patricia Cleary as the district’s superintendent. Cleary has been acting superintendent since January.
In addition to her role as the school’s chief, she plans to continue many of the duties she performed as assistant superintendent.
Under the reorganization, Cleary will oversee facilities, transportation, food service and noncurricular technology as well as other traditional superintendent duties. The board approved a three-year contract at an annual salary of $118,000.
In the past, Barberton schools have employed a business manager, maintenance supervisor, custodial supervisor, technology coordinator and treasurer. Under the new model, the district’s treasurer, Ryan Pendleton, will coordinate and supervise all financial and facility operations, as well as manage technology, food service and transportation. His new title will be chief financial officer and chief operations officer. He was awarded a five-year contract with an annual salary of $113,000.
Board members said they will begin discussing a plan for placing another levy on the ballot in August.
Voters rejected a levy in November.
Marilyn Miller can be reached 330 996-3098 or mmiller@thebeaconjournal.com.
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