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HWRSD puts 15 teachers on chopping block

Date: 4/23/2015

WILBRAHAM – Superintendent of Schools M. Martin O’Shea revealed at the April 14 Hampden-Wilbraham Regional School Committee meeting that 15 full-time teaching positions could be cut as a result of the district’s $1.3 million budget shortfall.

“This Friday, [April 17], we will have to produce reduction of force notices to teachers without professional teacher status (PTS),” he added. “Those are basically teachers with less than three years teaching experience.”

According to O’Shea, cuts would include 7.45 full time equivalent (FTE) teachers at the middle school level, 5.7 FTE at Minnechaug Regional High School and 2 FTE in the elementary schools.

In terms of content area, 8.7 FTE core content teachers, 2.25 FTE related arts and electives, and 4.2 FTE special education teachers and counselors would account for the 15.15 FTE cuts throughout the district, O’Shea said.

“Our practice has been to issue those notices to all non-PTS,” he added. “In fact, reduction notices will far exceed the ultimate number of cuts that we will have to make with this budget.”

The district would issue reduction of staff notices to PTS teachers at the end of the month, he noted.

“The final budget may not come to us until May or June probably,” O’Shea said. “So, much of what we’re doing here is still revenue projections and cost projections and so things can change over the course of the next couple of months.”

However, he added the district’s budget projections have remained unchanged since district budget meetings that took place in March, he noted.

Other cuts could include 10 to 12 FTE paraprofessional positions and 5.0 FTE non-direct service jobs, including custodial, clerical, student services, administration and curriculum coordination, and library services positions.

“This is what needs to happen to meet the bottom line of the approved budget,” O’Shea said. “I want to note that this year our two towns, Hampden and Wilbraham, made a significant effort.”

The $1.3 million shortfall is related to Chapter 70 monies not keeping pace with costs and a 60 percent reimbursement of regional transportation costs of $1.2 million, O’Shea said. The state is supposed to fully fund the district annually for regional transportation, which has not been the case during the last several years.

“This problem relates to stagnant state revenue, combined with [a] decline in enrollment, and rising costs,” he added.

Class size increases at the high school are expected to take place throughout the district because of the projected cuts, O’Shea noted.

“I think that we can safely say that across the district we will be within the ranges that we have historically been committed to,” he added. “We have tried to keep our core classes at under 25 students. I think that even with the reductions that were looking at we will still be able to do that. There will be pockets of exceptions to that, but by-in-large I think we will still be in decent shape with regard to class size.”

In other business, the School Committee voted to submit a letter to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) regarding searches of student’s social media accounts.

School Committee member Pat Gordon voted against submitting the letter due to its language. She proposed an amendment change one word in the letter, which was struck down by the committee.

School Committee Chair Marc Ducey said a few weeks ago the committee became aware that the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) requested Pearson to complete periodic searches of student’s social media accounts, with emphasis on looking for anything pertaining to PARCC such as photos or descriptions of the exam.

“The HWRSD School Committee’s strident objection to this practice rests on four main concerns,” Ducey stated in the letter addressed to DESE Deputy Commissioner Jeff Wulfson dated April 14.

Ducey said the practice “presupposes that students do not adhere to testing protocols and that our local test administrators and proctors are not diligent about banning cell phones from testing rooms”

Other objections stated in the letter are a violation of students’ privacy and a “costly and unwarranted intrusion by the state and Pearson into local school district matters.”

The fourth objection Ducey cited was DESE’s transferring of responsibility to the PARCC Consortium, “an entity over which DESE has no authority.”

The letter was carbon copied to state Sen. Eric Lesser, state Reps. Angelo Puppolo Jr. and Brian Ashe, the School Committee, and O’Shea.