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BOE transcripts: Board discussed deeper cuts

Posted June 23, 2016 11:00 pm

By Pete Spitler Staff Writer

EDITOR'S NOTE: The following information and quotes featured below are being reported by the newspaper as an indication of the information released to the media and made available to the public by the Chester District 139 Board of Education. To view the complete transcript click HERE

Faced with mounting financial uncertainty, the Chester District 139 Board of Education turned once again toward its headcount to reduce expenses.

The transcript of the board's Feb. 18 meeting - released to the media and the public by Interim District Superintendent Rick Goodman after the board's June 16 meeting due to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request from the Herald Tribune and County Journal - shows concern of the district's deficit spending, reaction to the unexpectedly quick switch to traditional scheduling and a desire to be "transparent" with the public regarding the issues facing the board.

Consistent with the Jan. 21 transcript, most of those speaking in executive session are not identified - only designated "unidentified male" or "unidentified female" - and portions are blacked out to allegedly indicate topics properly discussed under Open Meetings Act rules.

Other names of district employees are identified at the start of each executive session and/or referenced later on.

"I think it was just that we were changing into a traditional schedule, so you were changing your entire school culture and then now you are riffing (reducing in force) four areas of subject areas," a female voice reportedly said during schedule discussions. "So not only are your students going from eight classes that they could take, they are used to graduation requirements, they are used to every single aspect of that school, now you are down to seven classes that they can take and now you're cutting three of the programs that they can even take the classes in.

"I am concerned that this is a huge...I mean this will be an entire Chester High School."

During its March 18 meeting, the board voted to dismiss CHS English teacher Mike Springston and Chester Grade School sixth grade Math/Science teacher Joe Kassebaum.

A third teacher on the block, CHS Biology teacher Zach Jones, was saved when CHS Science teacher Brian Lin announced his resignation.

Speaking during public comment of the March meeting, Chester Education Association President Steve Colonel called the cuts "potentially disastrous" and the results of such action would mean larger class sizes and less options for students in their education.

"Their absence will continue to be felt for years," he said, referring to the teachers at stake.

During the board's June 16 meeting, Goodman announced that contract negotiations between the CEA and the district would begin on June 29.

The executive session transcript shows the board discussed deeper cuts, including the possible elimination of Driver's Education and the secretary position for CHS Counselor Franciene Sabens.

"I mean, we need to find a point where, what is the bare bones?" a female voice reportedly said. "You know, how much can we cut and I don't know that answer. I'm sorry I don't.

"That is where I felt like, you know, okay maybe one or two cuts, but eliminating five teachers, that is pushing that."

The board later discussed concerns on how the cuts would affect morale.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "We already have teachers leaving, the teachers understand this is coming. They don't want to admit it."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "No, this is going to shock them. I don't think they think this is coming.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Well I get them."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "This is going to shock…"

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "It's going to get real ugly."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "It is."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "It is. The morale, I mean…"

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "You're going to need more chairs in here, I can tell you that."

The board also expressed concerns regarding long-term survival of the district if the cuts weren't made.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "But if you don't make some of these decisions those are where you end up going because you can't run on borrowed money and until the state gets its act together, I don't know what we are going to do."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Well you get a budget."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "I think you have to prepare them for the worst and hope for the best."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "Well that's where I am at Tom. Is that I feel like this is the worst, at least at this point in time and if we can make it better, we will, but if not, then this is what we feel we have to do to make our district survive. I mean we have never been on a deficit reduction plan before, so understand this is as bad as it has been in the history of the school, definitely in the 15 years I have been serving."

During the session, it was stated that the district would be deficit spending in the range of $420,000 this fiscal year and a question was posed as to how many years the district has been deficit spending.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "This is by far the worst and why it jumped so much Sarah, I couldn't tell you. I don't know what happened."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "A big cut of $150,000 less from the state."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "I think what happened, we supplemented a couple of years with Obama and the Race to the Top stuff. We ended up getting what $286,000 that we split over two years and there has been some things that have covered this up for awhile.

There were one and two-time mandates that we run out of Band-Aids so now we are gushing because we don't have any more Band-Aids and I think that is what has happened.

Again, that was decisions we made to save the block schedule and not have some of these cuts four and five years ago.

We started deficit spending technically back then and there has been just a couple of things that we have come into a little extra money here and there where we didn't have to pull the Band-Aid.

Well, we have run out of Band-Aids, which was a great question. Yeah, it shouldn't have gotten bad this quick."

Class Scheduling

In October, at the direction of the school board, a "scheduling committee" was formed that includes the principals of both schools - Chester Grade School's Tim Lochhead and Chester High School's Dr. Sarah Gass - several teachers, board members Troy Clendenin and Debi Caraway and District Curriculum Director Shirley Stegmann.

In the executive session, the board members discussed research on a seven-class schedule - which could allow the district to reduce headcount immediately by a teacher and a half.

"We had done predictions," a female voice reportedly said. "We had met in first semester and we had done as many predictions as we could and we kind of roughly estimated it would be like a teacher and a half.

"So then in January, when we actually pulled these numbers, we had the students register for their eight classes. However, we had them put their first seven in the computer and we had them put their eighth one in a different location."

"So they think they are registered for eight classes right now," the voice continued. "But we were able to look at just their seven classes and we pulled their numbers."

The same female voice goes on to say that the school lost two sections of History, English, Science and Math, one of Family Consumer Science - and one of another class that was reported to be inaudible - by switching to the seven-class format.

"And the Industrial Tech department was down to five students, three students, four students, very, very low, but that is (Dallas Redeker) and he is up for retirement, so we couldn't eliminate that program," the voice said.

The scheduling committee later found that CHS could get by with one business teacher, but graduation requirements would have to be altered.

The scheduling committee asked Gass and Stegmann which one of English, Science or Math was to remain fully staffed and the decision was Math.

"They felt like those were our lowest test scores, a place we are struggling at as a school district, that they want some more or leave those resources alone and give us some time to get up to speed a little bit better," a male voice said.

Discussion moved to what the max capacity would be with each class "from a safety and learning standpoint" and there would be a lottery system for students if there were too many interested in a particular class.

"Then they would be the next in line the next year assuming they are juniors and come senior year, they would automatically get it if they still wanted it," the male voice continued. "It's no different than it happens at college sometimes.

"We don't like it, but we are down to making some tough decisions."

The quick switch to traditional scheduling appeared to cause alarm to at least one person in executive session.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "Can I at least have that we are off of block schedule next year, is that true? We are going to a seven…"

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "That is almost a no-brainer."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: "I think you are going to have to just do that."

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "I'm just, that is something that I have to get started on now. I mean our entire handbook has to be rewritten.

I have to call our gradebook company and redo all of our systems and stuff like that. This is going to be a huge undertaking that has done in a couple of months."

The board, ironically enough, also discussed being "transparent" about the issues the district is facing.

"I mean, yeah we can talk here, but when it comes down to doing it, I wish we could have the gymnasium full of everybody in the City of Chester, it would be great," a male voice reportedly said. "Then you can be transparent and explain what is going on but…"

"And we have never not been transparent as far as I know on this kind of stuff," another male voice reportedly said. "It's just tough pills to swallow and people don't like it and they don't have an answer because there is no answer."

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