Schools

School District Joins 'State of Emergency' Protests

Milpitas Unified employees showed their solidarity on Wednesday against proposed education budget cuts by state lawmakers.

As members of the California Teachers Association rally this week in Sacramento, declaring a fiscal state of emergency, Milpitas Unified teachers, administrators and classified employees showed their support locally.

About 150 school employees lined a section of East Calaveras Boulevard during rush hour on Wednesday.

Deborah Hullings-Le, fifth-grade teacher at Sinnott Elementary, said she participated, because she was concerned about fewer days of instruction, larger class sizes and less funding for music and sports. 

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"It's not just teachers losing jobs," she said.

School districts across the state are depending on the governor to extend sales, personal income and vehicle taxes that will expire June 30.

Find out what's happening in Milpitaswith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Without the extensions, Milpitas Unified, which serves nearly 10,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grades, projects three scenarios in which the state could cut $349 per student, $660 or even $825.

"Most likely, we would need to do a reduction in the work year [furloughs], program cuts, then layoffs," said Cheryl Jordan, assistant superintendent of human resources.

It's still too early to predict the impact on music and sports programs, she said.

Two years ago, the district cut the free music program in the elementary schools and asked families to pay to enroll their children.

"It's always the first thing to go," said Michael Vieyra, music teacher at Sinnott Elementary and Rancho Middle schools and secretary of the Milpitas Teachers Association. 

Jeff Lamb, athletic director of Milpitas High, said, "As a large high school, we already have fewer athletic teams compared to other high schools. 

"We would like to add more sports," he said, such as water polo, girls field hockey and boys volleyball. "We don't want to start cutting teams."

For Hullings-Le, who teaches 34 students in her fifth-grade class, student-teacher ratios are something to be concerned about.

The district participates in a class-size reduction program, in which the state pays per student to maintain a 20:1 student-teacher ratio. Kindergarten classes are at 20:1 in the district, but first and second grades are at 24:1. 

"The reason we're able to keep [the program] this year and next year is that the state department has relaxed the fine over the past few years," said Jordan.

Two years ago, third-grade classrooms in the district went from a 20:1 student-teacher ratio to 30:1.

On top of that, there haven't been any raises or cost-of-living adjustments for district employees for nearly four years.

Benefits are capped at $7,450.44 per year for an employee, according to Jordan, so they are expected to pay out-of-pocket costs. To enroll a dependent into Kaiser Permanente, that's an extra $988.97 per month.

Gov. Jerry Brown is expected to roll out his revised state budget early next week. At a town hall meeting at Stockton's Van Buren Elementary on April 14, he laid out the situation in front of a roomful of educators.

"It's a big debt that we got to deal with, and we do have tax extensions. The alternatives are not pretty," he said. 

"Right now we are stymied, because in order to get them on the ballot, we need a two-thirds vote," two Republican senators and two Republican assembly members, he said.

State Superintendent of Education Tom Torlakson, who also attended the event, said that without the tax extensions, a number of school districts could go into state receivership, because of financial distress.

"We're looking at doubling or tripling the number of schools that are going into qualified or negative status," he said. "And a number of them will just not be able to pay the bills. They won't be able to lay off faculty and staff fast enough, if tax extensions don't go through, to be able to have cash to make payroll."


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