In fact there was an article on the front page of the SF Chronicle on July 19th that talked about the fact that sixteen of the state’s 30 largest school districts are reducing the school year as a consequence of implementing furlough days. The most fascinating part of this article is that it just assumes the only way to reduce employees’ salaries is through furlough days. This is consistent with the conversations that I’ve heard as a school board member — in the government lexicon, salary reduction = furlough day.

This linkage presumably echoes a century-old, hourly-wage, framework when the way to reduce employee costs was to reduce the hours that employees work. Of course many people still work today based on an hourly wage, but generally teachers more fit the job description of a salaried professional than they do of a factory worker. And as many of us have experienced, so many private sector businesses have had to reduce their employees’ salaries over the last few years. Obviously reducing someone’s income is a horrible step to take, but if it must be done for financial reasons, why in the public sector does it automatically mean everyone should work less? As anyone who’s been in a private sector job knows, when a company runs into difficulty, you tend to work MORE, not LESS (even if just to pick up the slack for other employees who were laid off).

This analysis appears quite foreign to so many people. In almost all school districts (and other government agencies) across the state, it’s just assumed that you have to offer furlough days to save money. Let’s be clear — a furlough day in and of itself does not save any money (apart from very minor savings of utility costs by not operating a classroom or office); it is the salary reduction which saves the money. The obvious alternative is just to cut compensation, but leave the work year intact. It’s shocking that most people have never even thought of that, as our current mindset is so ingrained. These two actions have unfortunately been coupled — the reduction of compensation and the reduction of work load — when we should be talking about them separately. (Also note that this lexicon actually under-emphasizes the burden public employees are assuming — for example, a district may say “we furloughed six days” instead of saying “we gave a 3% salary cut,” which is really the impact on those teachers). Now maybe there are reasons for employee morale, etc., to “give back” something to your employees if you’re cutting their salaries, but people aren’t even talking about the problem like this. We all talk like it’s a given that these two actions are coupled.

It saddens me greatly to see so many school districts shorten the school year and cut non-student days as well, which are used largely for professional development to make instruction better. These actions directly hurt our kids, yet no one seems to be speaking for them. Of course our educational system is woefully underfunded, and it’s devastating that employees have to sacrifice financially because of it. But if such sacrifice is required, why also hurt children for no reason other than that’s the way we’ve always done it? The furlough may have had some justification one day in the past, but certainly for education that day has long passed.

I have, and will continue to be, a vigorous opponent of furlough days. Fortunately, in the San Carlos School District, we will not be cutting the school year (the final contract with the teacher’s union was approved by the Board on July 22nd) and we only added 1/2 of a furlough day (which was an optional training day). However, this is in addition to the two furlough days we granted last year, which in hindsight I believe was a mistake. I am happy that we finally have a contract (and I voted for the contract, because I thought it was a necessary compromise), and I thank all of the parties who worked so hard to come to agreement. Nonetheless, I will strongly and publicly push to ensure we add those days back to the work calendar next year, regardless of our financial situation.

In my role as a School Board Member, I have a great appreciation why government is (and should be) different from the private sector. And very often, citizens are quick to judge government as incompetent before understanding all of the context and the complexity of the issues. However, in this case, government is just being dumb. Furlough days are antiquated and hurt children. Parents should be up in arms and demand to both their local school board and their local unions that we just can’t accept them any longer.

Last year, SCEF raised approximately $1.3 million, and decided because of the continued and worsening State budget crisis, to set a very aggressive goal this year of raising $1.7 million. Frankly, although I admired the moxie (particulary in a weak economy), I thought this was a big stretch goal, and most weren’t counting on that money for the District. But continuing its many-year streak of hitting its goals, SCEF did it again — it just announced that it met the $1.7 million goal. Amazing!

I put this into context by remembering that when I joined the SCEF Board in 2004 (I served there until 2007 when I decided to run for School Board), we had raised approximately $400,000 (and it was less than $300K the year before). The SCEF’s current fundraising means that it supplies SCSD with over 7% of its budget — a truly staggering figure.

Although private fundraising can’t match the State’s amazing ability to cut our public funding, the work of SCEF will go along way to keeping our programs intact. In fact, it’s no coincidence that an agreement reached between the San Carlos Teachers’ Association and the District included some mitigation of the originally proposed cuts in compensation, as the District will likely have a better financial position in the Fall partly due to SCEF’s achievement (and also due to the work of the Superintendent on securing grants and starting our SMART-E “enterprise” activities). Also, the Board will take a look at the District’s financial position in September and hopefully be able to restore some of the program cuts made (which could include librarians and music – note that the originally proposed cuts to Vice Principals have already been reversed).

In any case, I want to give a big shout out to SCEF, the two co-Presidents, all of its board members and volunteers, and of course all of the parents, businesses, and other community members who so generously donated to the cause. It obviously makes a huge difference in the life of our kids!

Now, five months after we started, we are back to the same position the District has held the entire time. The Fact Finding panel has ruled almost exactly consistent with the District’s original position — that the SCSD indeed needs to make these cuts to keep the District financially viable, and that the SCTA should accept a series of concessions including across-the-board salary cuts and increased class sizes. You can read a letter from the District, an FAQ, and the actual Fact Finder report on the District web site. The Fact Finder panel also reiterated what the Board has stated publicly, which is if, in September, the financial outlook is better than forecasted, we could reduce some of these cuts.

I believe the District has been extremely consistent and fair in its position the entire time, and I am glad the independent appointees and reports all concur with the District’s position. The next step is that the District will try one final time to reach agreement with the SCTA, and if it can not, it is allowed to implement its last offer (or something similar, but not more than is in that offer). In any case, hopefully the process will be over soon.

As I’ve said multiple times, it’s of course terrible to lay off employees or to reduce employees’ compensation, but given the terrible financial circumstances it is certainly the “least worst” option and in fact much less impactful than the actions that are happening in other school districts up and down the state.

The chart below shows the historical and projected reserve levels based on a few scenarios. All of the scenarios below assume the sunset of the Measure D parcel tax.

Chart of District Reserves

The dotted orange line is the scenario with the currently contemplated budget cuts. Under this scenario we will finally go from two years of deficit spending to basically being breakeven in 2010-2011. The following year (2011-2012) then reduces the reserve below the required 3% minimum if we lose the Measure D parcel tax revenue. If we are able to renew it, then the line would stay roughly level. Of course all of the above assumes no dramatic changes in state funding, and we all know there is downside risk there.

The other lines illustrate why these cuts we’re contemplating are so necessary. With no cuts at all (the gray dotted line), we literally run out of money next year. If we just include the administrative and program cuts we’ve already agreed to but do not cut compensation expenses (the solid blue line), we drop below the 3% level next year, and then completely run out of money the following year.

Of course it is devastating to have to make cuts to teachers and other employees, but sadly there are no other alternatives. And as I mentioned in the Board meeting last night, I like to think the glass is “half full,” meaning we have actually done an amazing job at mitigating impacts to teachers, the classroom, and overall cuts because of our efforts in fundraising with the SCEF, the early cuts we made to administration, as well as the efforts of our Superintendent to create new revenue generating services. We only need to look at so many other school districts in the state which have implemented larger salary cuts and made larger class size increases. This is not to say we’re proud of what we have to do, but we do need to appreciate all of the hard work by so many people which has enabled us to minimize the impact of the devastating state cuts to education.

If you would like to better understand how we got into this situation and how California education finance works, I encourage everyone to watch my video on the topic. It outlines the history of education finance in this state, how districts are funded, the relationship between the state and the local districts, and what our options are.

We have also just seen the effect of this bizarre and shortsighted funding system. Today the San Carlos School District sent a letter out (which is posted on its web site) from the Superintendent and Board President about where we are with the budget and teacher layoffs. May 15th was the second critical deadline to give notices to affected teachers. The bad news is that the budget crisis is still very real and very large. The good news is that the final layoff notices were for a reduced number of teachers (18, as compared to 29 originally in March).

Although it’s of course devastating to lose great teachers (and increasing class size is something no one wants to do), San Carlos has accomplished what many other districts have not been able to do and mitigated these cuts as much as possible. For example, Redwood City is lopping off a full week of the school year and increasing class sizes higher than we are. The relative success of our school district (and I say “relative” as the absolute magnitude of the cuts are still huge) is largely due to three factors:

• the success of the San Carlos Education Foundation, which has set a very aggressive fundraising goal this year
• the aggressiveness of our Superintendent in finding additional revenue sources from grants and new programs such as SMART-E camps
• the mid-year cuts we made to administrative positions earlier in the year

Of course we are still at the mercy of the State budget, which will likely not be resolved for months, and it has significant “downside” risk in the final outcome. As we are nearing the end of this school year, obviously the main thing we all can do to make a difference is to donate to SCEF.

The original list in March included 28 employees who received these preliminary “pink slips” and this covered approximately 18.5 FTEs (as some folks do not work full time). Over the last two months, with a ton of work from staff, teachers’ representatives, and the Board, this list was whittled down to 18 employees and approximately 13 FTEs. Of course it is absolutely terrible that we need to layoff anyone — and it certainly impacts the education and the programs that we deliver — but we’re fortunate to have mitigated this damage somewhat. I’m also happy to report that two of the positions that will NOT be reduced are the middle school assistant principals, as I believe those roles are essential to the functioning of our middle schools.

Although the final budget is not completed — nor is the contract for next year with the teachers’ union — the effect of these staff reductions will likely mean class sizes increasing by two students per class across all grade levels, with some flexibility at some sites to increase classes by two more to properly balance classroom, avoid splits if appropriate, etc. And of course these are not the only cuts we will be making. These too are not finalized until the budget is adopted in June, but they will likely include some reductions in programs as well as salary reductions across the board (note that this is on top of cuts already made, including a number of positions eliminated at the District office mid-year). Also, the Superintendent has been very aggressive in looking for additional revenue sources, including grants as well as our SMART-E camp/after-school program. These activities have also contributed to mitigating the necessary cuts.

We’re hardly out of the woods yet — we still need to find out what the state will do to our budget (the Governor’s “May revise” comes out tomorrow) as well as ensure that we renew Measure D next year. I encourage everyone to attend the final set of board meetings this year as budget will continue to be the primary topic. And of course, continue to give (and encourage others to give) to the San Carlos Education Foundation — that source of funding is absolutely crucial to our maintaining the excellent school district that we have!

Well, now the first version of that video is done and posted online. Although my graphics are a bit primitive and the audio isn’t perfect, I think it does a good job capturing the history of California school finance, how it works now, some of the structural problems that tie our hands, and what we can do about it. It’s a little long — 40 minutes — but if you can take some time, I encourage you to take a look (it’s divided into chapters, so it can be viewed in multiple sessions).

Click here to get to the video. Let me know what you think!

The finalists are: Colorado, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina and Tennessee. Winners will be announced in April. Here is the Washington Post article on the finalist announcement.

Here is a related article on how the scoring worked for determining finalists. The rubric included items like making education funding a priority, demonstrating significant progress in raising achievement and closing gaps, developing and adopting common academic standards, turning around the lowest-achieving schools, ensuring successful conditions for high-performing charter or other autonomous public schools, and improving teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance.

I have stated many times that I thought it was a low likelihood that California would be eligible for this program, and even if it were, the benefit for a small district like San Carlos would not likely be significant. That said, it doesn’t mean it’s not worth trying to be eligible for Federal money (assuming the the requirements are consistent with our values), so I suspect California will try again in the second round of RTTT in June. However, I wouldn’t hold my breath.