Santa Rosa embarks on painful, deep school cuts

Middle school librarian Cathryn Howell has lived through budget cuts, but if Santa Rosa City Schools eliminates another seven librarian positions, campus library services will be reduced to a shell of what they are now, the 10-year district veteran said.

“You are basically eliminating the library program,” she said. “You would certainly have a room with books that are able to be checked in and out...(but) the teaching element would go away.”

Cutting more than seven librarian positions, running the library with classified staff and instituting a central leadership role for the entire district, would save the district $540,000 a year.

The library cuts are one in a list of 63 items totalling nearly $10 million the board will consider as it tries to cut $5.7 million from the 2010-11 budget. Another $4.7 million is anticipated to be cut from the 2011-12 budget.

The school board meets Wednesday to debate the choices, the first of six public meetings to get input and start crafting the tough choices.

“We need to work with the public and see what their threshold is and what they can tolerate or not,” said board member Frank Pugh. “I know we are going to have advocates for everything on this list, every one.”

And the list is long.

The board will consider cutting up to five days from the academic school year; increasing class sizes in kindergarten through third grade to as high as 29 students per teacher; cutting middle and high school athletics 25 percent; closing Mesa, Midrose and Grace small necessary high school campuses; eliminating teacher preparatory time at elementary schools thereby cutting physical education, art and music classes for students.

Teachers union president Dan Evans criticized the proposed list, saying too few of the proposed cuts target the district office.

The budget list includes a $300,000 item to be taken from district administration depending on what programs are cut elsewhere.

Cutting the school year, as well as eliminating elementary teacher prep time must be agreed to by the union and Evans said cutting the prep hours “is a non-starter.”

“They need physical education and art and computer classes as well. They can't just do math and English all day long,” he said.

But the district's Year 2 federal Program Improvement status for failing to meet all federal academic standards under the No Child Left Behind law is likely to loom large over budgetary decisions in the coming weeks.

The district fell into sanctions last year for failing to meet proficiency targets for students learning English, economically disadvantaged students and Latino students. The district failed to main sufficient gains this year and went into Year 2 status.

Among the items on the proposed list of cuts is $675,560 for exit exam-related counseling at the high schools. Exit exam success is a factor in calculating the district's ability to meet federal standards.

The board will also consider increasing class size up to 30 students for kindergarten through third grade, and adding one student to ninth grade English and math classes to reach 29 students per teacher. The board voted to grow those classes from 24 students to 28 this school year.

“The program improvement issue is huge,” Evans said. “It doesn't make any sense educationally. We are a P.I. second-year district. I don't understand how they can even be considering that frankly.”

Pugh said he isn't enthusiastic about growing the kindergarten through third grade classes in part because of the surge in combination grade classes it caused this year.

“I will say for our district, having more combination classes makes it particularly difficult to meet the standards that we are supposed to be meeting so we aren't in Program Improvement,” he said. “That is another twist on the entire issue for us.”

Trustee Tad Wakefield said his first priority is negotiating a shorter school year with the teacher's union to save as much as $2.1 million. Eliminating the arts, music and computer programs in elementary schools by axing prep periods would save another $574,000, he said.

“I'm very concerned about that, however with the budget at $10 million (in cuts) in the next two years, it just seems prudent that as much stay on the table for us to consider until we don't have to,” he said.

Wakefield would like to see more options for cuts at the district office and also at the school site administration level.

“I think a lot of the school sites are really tight, but let's face it, schools are still going to run with one less vice principal,” he said.

And if cutting back library programs keep class sizes smaller, he is willing to consider that move.

“I'm very comfortable with cutting libraries because I know many of the libraries can be just places to hang out and I'm not convinced they are being utilized as effectively (as they could),” he said. “I think kids use technology on their own. It seems to me that it's a great place to start to have some savings.”