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School District Announces Budget, Proposed CutsSuperintendent says teachers' jobs won't be cutRelated Content
ANCHORAGE - The Anchorage School District said it needs to fill a $25 million budget gap for next year, and Friday the administration came out with the cuts it’s proposing to make that happen. District Superintendent Jim Browder said they looked first at their own administrative staff, an area that is often criticized for being top-heavy. The plan is to reduce jobs there by 8 percent. Browder said one area that won’t see cuts are classroom teachers. “Our focus is clearly on the classroom, and if you look at the reductions you'll see a real clear understanding that we are avoiding that at all costs,” said Browder. But individual schools will feel cuts. Many of the positions eliminated are teacher’s assistants. Browder said the district has more people in that job than it needs. “If you look at best practices and do comparables with other districts in the nation,” said Browder, “our number is extremely high. So, through attrition, we hope to get that back into a manageable number.” Attrition is a big part of the budget plan. Brower said if pink slips were handed out tomorrow, about 100 people would lose their jobs. Browder said he is hoping that by the time next school year starts, that retirements and moves will bring that number down to 50. But officials said the bigger problem remains: the fact that the state has not increased the school funding formula while fixed costs for school districts continue to rise. Without some sort of inflation proofing, districts say, budget gaps will continue to grow every year. Anchorage School Board President Jeannie Mackie said in the coming years, those gaps won’t be filled by attrition alone. “We do have difficult years from now on out, and there is only so long that we are going to be able to balance the budget using managed attrition as we have here today,” said Mackie. “Tough times are ahead.” Browder said he’d like to see more money from Juneau, but also feels a responsibility to work with the dollars he has. He said one thing that would help is if teachers and other unions would pledge to take a pay freeze for next year. He said he plans to ask them that question next week. As for the coming year, Browder said parents shouldn’t worry. He said the cuts should not affect their child’s education in a negative way, and that the district is more focused than ever on meeting improvement goals by 2020. |
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SAM JALL said on Saturday, Jan 19 at 8:17 PM
These cuts are a huge mistake if one truly cares about good education for all of our children.
111739591Good said on Sunday, Jan 20 at 1:36 PM
Keep cutting the overhead if one truly cares about great education for the kids. Cut stupid jobs like field trip coordinator and other wasted jobs that could be handled in 10 mins by anyone.
111781862Thank God said on Sunday, Jan 20 at 11:38 PM
Cut it, cut it now, and keep cutting. What a waste, what is it like 17,500 per child now or 20,000? KTVA left that out. Needs to be within 1000 of what the private sector can do. Shut down the ASD. Do it now before the city/state/Feds spend one more dime. If they don't shape up we will all be broke trying to fund a sub standard failing school system. Guess what percentage of kids have to take remedial classes in college here before they can take one they get credit for? yah
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