Sacramento Bee Article on Natomas schools - Dec. 27th

Natomas budget cuts hit classrooms; parents worried

By Diana Lambert dlambert@sacbee.com q{

Published: Sunday, Dec. 27, 2009 - 12:00 am Page 5B
Natomas Unified School District officials have reached deep into classrooms to balance their budget.
They have cut days from the school year, reduced class periods for most juniors and seniors, relaxed graduation requirements and eliminated summer school.
And parents are worried.
"They need to start putting the kids first," said Elena Quintero, president of the Inderkum High School Parent Teacher Student Association.
She is concerned about the district's decision to reduce the number of units required for graduation and to cut counselors.
"Counselors now don't even have the time to go over a schedule with kids, let alone go over graduation requirements and college applications," said Quintero, whose son is a freshman at the school.
Quintero and a handful of other parents were at a meeting last week at Inderkum High School where interim Natomas Unified Superintendent General Davie Jr. and other district staff talked about plans to cut another $20 million over this year and the following two.
Many of the parents in the room that night have already enrolled their children in charter schools.
Chana Wynne has three children in district charter schools.
"I think eventually the charters will be affected too," Wynne said.
This year 400 students migrated from district schools to Natomas Pathways Preparatory School after the charter school added middle grades. This migration will cost the district $2.5 million in state funding by the end of the school year.
The 12,000-student district also has lost 807 students to Natomas Charter, 321 to Westlake Charter and 512 to Natomas Pathways Preparatory School's high school.
Davie said charters offer healthy competition to districts. "They are part of the fabric of educational offerings in the Natomas community," he said.
But district officials are concerned enough about the bleeding charters are causing that they have made retaining and attracting students part of their budget recovery plan.
"We need to attract students that left us," Assistant Superintendent John Christ told the parents.
But that may be a hard sell in a district that has had to make over $11 million in cuts this school year alone. Cuts over a three-year period include closing a school, increasing class sizes, eliminating all elementary and middle school counselors, ending all but special education transportation, reducing library technicians, limiting athletics and postponing the adoption of new textbooks.
District officials have so far identified $15.5 million in potential cuts to help offset the nearly $20 million still needed. The only options left to reduce the budget are to lay off more staff, negotiate more concessions from unions, close a second school, generate new income or make more cuts to schools, according to district staff.
"As desperate as it is, we may have to look at more cuts," Christ said.
All California schools are struggling with state budget cuts. They received $18 billion less than anticipated in state funding a year ago, said state schools chief Jack O'Connell in a previous Bee interview. That was despite an influx of federal dollars from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act.
The Folsom Cordova Unified School District will close two schools at the end of the school year, as will the San Juan Unified School District. The Sacramento City Unified School District closed four schools at the end of the 2008-09 school year.
The Elk Grove Unified School District also is struggling with budget cuts, voting recently to reduce spending on district sports programs, increase K-3 class sizes and eliminate 592 positions.
Like Natomas, Folsom Cordova officials voted to shave a class period off the school day for high school juniors and seniors. But no other Sacramento County school district has taken the drastic measure of cutting the school year.
So how did Natomas Unified get into this situation?
District leaders didn't make timely decisions, Davie told The Bee last week. He said the district's decision in May to postpone layoffs was a mistake. Instead, the district waited until August to lay off 59 teachers and counselors.
The picture could be even more grim next month when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger presents his proposed budget for next year. Educators are hoping there are no more cuts to school districts.
"We're worried," Davie said. "We hope education has had its turn. We're preparing."