Schools prepare notices of layoffs

The Eugene School District is in the process of informing more than 84 teachers and other teaching-oriented staff members with low seniority that they could lose their jobs at the end of the school year as part of an estimated $24 million in cost-saving measures to balance the budget for the 2011-12 school year.

The notices could go out today if school is in session and not canceled for a second consecutive day because of snow and/or icy road conditions. If not today, then likely Monday.

“We are preparing layoff notices to go out soon,” district spokeswoman Kerry Delf said Thursday. “Later this week or next week.”

Several principals confirmed Thursday that today is the day that notices go out if school is in session.

Principals received from the district Wednesday their staffing ratio plans for the 2011-12 school year, and they are based on a student-to-teacher staffing increase of four students at each district school. The average ratio now in the district for grades K-3 is 24 students for every teacher, and for grades 4-12, 26 students for every teacher.

Reducing the district’s current pool of 827 teachers and other licensed staff, such as special education teachers, nurses and counselors, by the equivalent of 84 full-time employees will allow for the average increase of four students per teacher at each school.

But the number of actual layoffs for 2011-12 could change in the coming months depending on how much state funding the district gets this spring, upcoming negotiations concerning concessions for pay and benefit freezes with employee groups, and whether Eugene voters pass a city income tax for Eugene and Bethel schools on May 17.

The Eugene School Board voted on Feb. 2 to follow departing Superintendent George Russell’s recommendations for about $24 million in cost-saving measures, including the teacher layoffs based on a staffing ratio increase of 2.5 to four students per school, plus administration and classified staff layoffs, closing four elementary schools, and using up to $5 million in reserve funds. Those are cuts the board can control. The board also voted to pursue Russell’s other recommendations, such as pay and benefit freezes for employees and more furlough days, which will depend on negotiations with employee groups.

The district is going with the higher staffing ratio increase of four per school right now, because it will be easier to decrease that number than increase it in the coming months, when the district’s financial picture clears, Delf said.

The board also voted Feb. 2 to lay off 10 percent of its administrative and classified staffs, the equivalent of 62 full-time positions. Those notices will go out later, Delf said.

Madison Middle School Principal Rick Gaultney, who was home during Thursday’s “snow day” working on his school’s staffing plan for next fall, which is due to the district by March 18, said losing classified staff — instructional assistants, school secretaries, food service workers, custodians — will be as devastating as losing teachers.

“So much of it is just having adults present,” Gaultney said of having staff to watch kids during lunchtime and recess.

For South Eugene High School, the district’s second-largest school with about 1,500 students, Principal Randy Bernstein is looking at informing today or Monday the equivalent of eight full-time teachers, out of 50-plus teachers, that they may not be coming back in the fall.

“So it’s a pretty deep cut,” Bernstein said.

At Madison, Gaultney is looking at losing six out of 25 teachers, which he said will increase class sizes from an average of 31 students to almost 38 students per class.

“It’s pretty dramatic, it really is,” Gaultney said. “We have a number of notices that will be going out (Friday).”

The “breaking point” for teachers who will be let go is about three years of experience, Gaultney said. “You have these wonderful teachers who are incredibly hard-working,” he said. “There’s going to be a lot of tough conversations.”