We at least temporarily have an Office of Civil Rights back

 Well, well, well, what do you know? If you lay off hundreds of people who deal with civil rights complaints in the U.S. Department of Education, what do you end up with?

...a growth in its massive backlog of those complaints. 

Thus on Friday, U.S. Ed called back hundreds of those employees, though not without the trademark unprofessional snark that is a current hallmark of the agency: 

In the email to employees, the department said “it is important to refocus OCR’s work and utilize all OCR staff to prioritize OCR’s existing complaint caseload.” 

“In order for OCR to pursue its mission with all available resources, all those individuals currently being compensated by the Department need to meet their employee performance expectations and contribute to the enforcement of existing civil rights complaints,” the email notes.

Remember, Secretary McMahon has repeatedly said that the mandates Congress has for the Department can and are being carried out, but as USA Today notes: 

Education Secretary Linda McMahon's decision to tap into her own laid-off workforce provides further evidence her agency is struggling more than she has publicly indicated to meet its legally mandated responsibilities.

Since cutting the department in half earlier this year, many families waiting on resolutions to their civil rights complaints have been stuck in limbo. Colleges have also reported significant issues with the federal financial aid system.

 I should note that the first report I saw of this was in FedScoop.

Will we have a U.S. Department of Education Tuesday?

 As we were warned, the Trump administration is using the federal shutdown as an excuse to issue layoff notices--including a little 'oops' moment at the CDC, which they're now blaming on a coding issue--leading many of us to wonder just how much of the U.S. Department of Education will exist as of Tuesday after the holiday weekend. 

Why do we always come here...on the FY25 WPS budget before Council

Why do we always come here

I guess we'll never know

It's like a kind of torture

To have to watch the show…
from "The Muppet Show Theme"

I had family commitments yesterday afternoon, so I was unable to make it to the Worcester City Council taking up the Worcester Public Schools' budget. Thanks to the wonder of recording, however, we can all relive it, and I think the only way I can bear this is to blog it. 

I post the above, by the way, not to call anyone a Muppet, but to note again that a) Worcester does this backwards, as school committees in Massachusetts send their requested appropriation to their appropriating authorities, and of course the Worcester School Committee hasn't yet met on the budget, b) the Worcester City Council, like any appropriating authority, has very little oversight of the Worcester Public Schools budget.
Both of that, incidentally, are per MGL Ch. 71, sec. 34:

Every city and town shall annually provide an amount of money sufficient for the support of the public schools as required by this chapter, provided however, that no city or town shall be required to provide more money for the support of the public schools than is appropriated by vote of the legislative body of the city or town. In acting on appropriations for educational costs, the city or town appropriating body shall vote on the total amount of the appropriations requested and shall not allocate appropriations among accounts or place any restriction on such appropriations. The superintendent of schools in any city or town may address the local appropriating authority prior to any action on the school budget as recommended by the school committee notwithstanding his place of residence. The city or town appropriating body may make nonbinding monetary recommendations to increase or decrease certain items allocating such appropriations.

The vote of the legislative body of a city or town shall establish the total appropriation for the support of the public schools, but may not limit the authority of the school committee to determine expenditures within the total appropriation.

And also, of course, the city charter in section 5-2 says:

 The city council may, by majority vote, make appropriations for the purposes recommended and may reduce or reject any amount recommended in the annual budget, but except on recommendation of the city manager, shall not increase any amount in or the total of the annual budget, nor add thereto any amount for a purpose not included therein, except as provided in section thirty-three of chapter forty-four of the General Laws.

There are very few questions the Council has purview to ask, and very little they can do, and that's even if they funded schools appropriately!
So when I say I don't know why we do this: I really don't know why this is what is done!
And this is not the first time I have said this.

Let's talk about these Senate budget amendments

They were due Friday, but I only got through them yesterday. Debate doesn't begin until Monday, though, so you still have time to contact your Senator's office to enlist their endorsement. As the Senate sorts their amendments by topic, you can find all the education-related ones here.

As per usual, if you're looking for earmarks, you're on your own: these are ones that impact more than one district and in K-12. Opining, as per usual, is entirely mine. 
Also there are several "let's have a foundation budget review!" amendments, which I am going to give their own blog post. 

On inflation:
Amendment 743 just straightforwardly adds the $217M (Thank you, Senator Moore!) which is the amount the jointly endorsed MASC/MASS/MTA/AFT-MA solution would cost.

Amendment 758 puts in $100M for "inflation relief," though it specifies that it would not go into base aid in future years, which rather misses the point.

The rest of these don't fix anything for this year:
Amendment 735 would establish an escrow bank, where any year where inflation was over 4.5%, the difference would be "banked" to be distributed in years when it was less.
Amendment 644 uses the calculation requested, but starts it in 2026. 
Amendment 798 uses the calculation requested, and, while it doesn't specify 2026, since it conflicts with the language the budget outlines, per Section 3, it wouldn't go into effect this year. 

Other Chapter 70 and core aid related things:
Showing his usual zest for amendment, Senator Tarr has submitted Amendments 615 for $125, 618 for $120, and 619 for $110 per pupil minimum aid. And this is your ongoing reminder that every increase makes it more likely that fewer districts will escape hold harmless during the implementation of SOA remaining, and that this funding has no relation to student or municipal need.

Amendment 666 is chapter 70 "extraordinary relief" of $18.5M, targeted only at places where the required local contribution is more than 30% of local revenue

Amendment 799 is $5M in relief "municipalities who rank in the lowest 10% of municipalities in both of the following categories: (i) total per-pupil dollar expenditure; and (ii) actual net school spending." This means it won't be the highest need districts, as those have required per pupil expenditures that are higher.

School choice:
Amendment 720 would raise the per pupil amount of a school choice student from $5000 to $7500.

Rural aid:
Amendment 631 would raise it from $15M to $17.5M

METCO:
Amendment 635 would raise it from $29.4M to $33M and would also allow funds to be carried to the following December

Charter school facilities:
Amendment 709 would raise the charter school facilities per pupil amount (which comes from a sending district's Chapter 70 aid) to $1288 from $1188

Regional transportation:
Amendments 623 would raise it to $106.5; 661 and 734 and 748 to $121.1M

Special education and circuit breaker:
Amendment 705 would phase in circuit breaker being 100% reimbursement of the "extraordinary" costs, with 75% for FY25 moving to 80% in FY26, 90% in FY27, 95% in FY28, and 100% in FY29, but would immediately put 100% into place for any children whose parents or guardians do not reside in Massachusetts or who are placed outside their hometown.

Amendment 639 would study the delivery of special education services

Vocational:
Amendment 611 would move the CTE line from $2.5M to $3.5M; 711 to $4.5M

Amendment 663 would move transportation reimbursement for out of district vocational from $1M to $2M

Amendment 751 would require a vocational admissions lottery

Amendment 752 would create vocational annexes to comprehensive high schools in cities

Amendment 755 would create a commission on such annexes

Advanced Placement:
Amendment 622 would increase the AP math and science line from $2M to $3.3M

Amendment 654 would require state colleges and universities to take an AP score of 3, 4, or 5 for credit

Early college:
Amendment 708 would take the early college line from $3M to $3.5M

Amendment 731 would create a five year strategic plan on early college in the state

Sex ed
Amendment 756 would require biannual collection of sex education in districts in the Commonwealth

Early literacy:
Amendments 687 and 780 would raise the "Literacy Launch" amount from $10M to the $30M that would match the Governor and House

Amendment 787 is the terrible literacy bill that would mandate curriculum be taken from a state list

SEL:
Amendment 640 would increase the SEL line from $6M to $8M

School to career:
Amendment 714 would increase the school to career line from $7.3M to $8.5M

After and out of school:
Amendment 665 would increase the budgeted $8.6M to $10.6M

Diversity in education:
Amendment 689 would student the impact of layoffs of this year and last on teachers of color

MSBA:
Amendment 760 adds "collaboratives" to the study of the MSBA that the Senate included in the outside section (starts on page 67)

Trusts:
Amendment 621 would increase the civics trust from $1.5M to $2.5M

Amendment 750 would increase the genocide trust from $2.25M to $3M

Layoffs going out today

I hate having to post this. Best information I have, with emphasis added, though: the Worcester School Committee received the following this afternoon from Superintendent Boone:

The Administration continues to work with the City Manager regarding the FY15 funding level based on the House of Representatives budget and the amount of city contribution for next year.  The WPS Budget will be available on Friday, May 9^th and will be balanced based on our estimate of local, state, and federal revenue for next year. 

In order to meet our contractual obligations with the EAW, we need to proceed with posting of job vacancies for next year. To conduct this process, we must notify employees that will be laid off or displaced next year as a result of the budget deficit based upon the Administration’s recommended budget.  These layoff and displacement notices are being provided to employees today.    

In the elementary positions, we are planning on an average districtwide class size of approximately 22.8 students and we do not anticipate class sizes of more than 30 students (unless lack of available space within schools do not allow for additional teacher positions).  Also, please know that we “over cut” the number of positions to allow for a number of positions to be available in August/September to address enrollment changes that often occur between now and the start of the new school year. 

With regards to secondary school positions, the reductions identified by the Administration would not reduce course offerings to students next year.  However, we also do not see any changes in the number of study halls offered next year. 

I am working closely with City Manager Augustus on the budget level for next year.  I will provide a full summary of the budget actions that will be included in the Administration’s FY15 budget once we finalize the level of city funding for next year.  I will provide this information as soon as we have a bottom line budget. 

And I've said it before and I'll say it again: there is no budget until it is passed by the Worcester School Committee at the end of June.

Don't panic: organize (Round two)

Hearing concerns from parents that layoffs are happening now, even though we don't yet know what the final budget will look like.
Yes, that is true, on both counts!
We've had budgets these last few years that haven't involved layoffs like this, so for those who haven't been through this already:

•  In order for Human Resources to hold up our end of the contractual agreements about position changes, notices of position cuts and layoffs have to go out now, for those changes to be processed and take place before the end of the year. Openings that will occur due to retirement, due to teacher's not having professional status, due to layoffs, or otherwise, go out on the "bid list" for those within the system that are interested. There are several rounds of this, and it's starting now.
• This always happens prior to the budget. The budget won't come out until the first week of May; it won't be deliberated until June. That's far too late for decisions about cuts and class sizes and assignments to be made.
• If changes have to be made over the summer, it's much easier to make them in a positive direction--adding teachers to cut class size, assigning support staff, opening additional sections--than to make cuts over the summer.
• And finally--and you're going to hear this a lot from me in the coming weeks--NO BUDGET IS FINAL UNTIL IT IS VOTED ON IN ITS ENTIRETY BY THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE. 

So, if you are hearing about cuts at your child's school, if you're concerned about course selection, if you've heard something about staffing levels: don't panic. Don't give up. 

Also, don't think that means that the school administration or the School Committee has given up. We plan for the worst; we hope and work for the best.

If you now have specifics about your school, NOW is the time to make those calls and emails, to have those conversations, about what a school budget that isn't appropriately funded looks like for your school. 

The School Committee doesn't determine our bottom line; the Worcester City Council and City Manager do.

Teachers being replaced in Chicago

And a bit more from Chicago: while 2100 staff were laid off last week, the Chicago Public Schools also:

"...has committed to more than doubling its investment in the TFA program that trains college graduates for five weeks then sends them into schools for two years at a time. The Board of Education voted to increase its payment to TFA from $600,000 to nearly $1.6 million, and to add up to 325 new TFA recruits to CPS classrooms, in addition to 270 second year “teacher interns”."

And remember, in addition to the payment to TFA, CPS will also be paying those recruits and interns a teaching salary and benefits.

More from Chicago

Today over 2100 teachers and staff in the Chicago Public Schools were laid off. Because that's getting up into "numbers so big they don't mean anything," that's about 2/3 of the teaching staff of the Worcester Public School, or about half of all of our employees.
This is part of the same mess I posted about yesterday--the Chicago Public Schools' budget gap, which is estimated at $1 billion. The crazy thing about laying off staff to close a budget gap, however, is this: when a public school district lays off an employee, and that employee becomes eligible for unemployment, the unemployment must be paid by the public district laying off the employee. Thus a district really doesn't save as much by laying off staff as you at first might think, since unemployment has to go up while the salary line is cut. It's not by the same amount, but it is substantial. If you've heard this discussed by the School Committee here in Worcester before, you might remember that most of the savings actually comes in the employee health insurance. I haven't seen any estimates from CPS on how much they are projecting them would save, but, then, I would be concerned about their numbers regardless.

And on a related note, the Chicago Tribune is reporting today that the Chicago Public Schools have recently replaced lighting in several of their schools that they plan to close. What's more, without an equivalent to MSBA to pick up part of the cost on a major project, the administration has set up a program whereby investors can get their money back and more by receiving the savings created by more efficient lighting...
...except that isn't going to happen if the lights are never on, or the building is sold.

CTU files suit, citing discrimination

The Chicago Teachers Union has filed suit against the Chicago Board of Education, citing race discrimination. From the Teacher Beat:

The Chicago Public Schools' recent rounds of layoffs have disproportionately affected African-American teachers, the Chicago Teachers Union alleges in a class action filed this week.Even though black teachers make up only less than 30 percent of the teaching force, they were hardest hit by the layoffs, the lawsuit states. For example, of the 347 tenured teachers laid off in 2012, 51 percent were African-American.
In the lawsuit filed Dec. 27, the union says that the district's "turnaround" efforts, which involve the replacement of up to every teacher in a school so designated—and sometimes the conversion of the school into a charter—are to blame for the disproportional layoffs. Those schools have been located on the city's west and south sides, where many African-American teachers work. And the district's process for selecting the schools for turnaround isn't transparent or clear, the union contends.
The lawsuit seeks a moratorium on turnarounds and the implementation of "less discriminatory alternatives."

No word yet back from the district.

Worcester Teacher Layoffs: Update as of 4/15

Having just received my weekly packet from the administration, I've got new and somewhat different numbers on layoffs. Here's what I now have:
 The administration is proposing layoffs of:

• 39 teachers: 27 elementary, 7 special education, and 5 secondary
• 51 IA's
• 5 parent liaisons (that's all that we have)

There is also a mention of reducing 12 positions under Finance and Operations (some of this has already started) by consolidating and outsourcing, which is projected to save $345,000.
There is also a "consolidation of administrative positions" but no mention of which or how much it might save.

I'll send out some questions this afternoon to see if I can clear some of this up. Add your questions in the comments or send me an email.

Worcester teacher layoffs

I see from the EAW newsletter (halfway down page 3) that "the administration plans to lay off 25 elementary teachers, 5 secondary positions, 10 special education positions, 48 special education instructional assistants, 1 math/science instructional assistant, 3 itinerant teachers, 2 ESL accommodation IA's and 5 parent liaisons."
No, I did not know this.
The last information the School Committee was given was an estimate that the budget gap was equal to (but might or might not require) 134 positions being cut. We have been told nothing since.

I think "disappointed" is too weak a word for my thoughts on the administration not informing the financial authority for the school system of layoffs. I think "lack of communication" doesn't being to approach exactly how large a gap this is.

"Outrageous" might come close.

Twice today already I have been approached by people in the system wanting to discuss this. It was simply luck that I'd read the newsletter this morning and so had the slightest clue what they were talking about. This isn't embarrassing for me personally--I read everything I'm sent--but it does rather point up in an obvious fashion a misapprehension, now approaching, I think, a dangerous point of who needs to know what when and who has what authority.

____________________________________________
I should point out, again, that while layoff notices have to go out now, due to the teachers' contract, that NO DECISION on FY12 is made until the School Committee votes on the budget at the end of June. If you have a concern, an opinion, a suggestion, you absolutely should contact the School Committee (and, if you think it's a matter of money, the state legislators and the City Council) regarding the budget.

Providence lays off ALL their teachers

The City of Providence, Rhode Island has given pink slips to all city teachers this week in anticipation of massive layoffs (necessitating contract changes) for the coming school year. Rhode Island law requires that teachers be notified of potential changes in their positions by March 1. Superintendent Tom Brady (yes, that is his name; he's also a Broad Academy graduate, for those keeping track) says it was necessary to close a projected $40 million budget gap for FY12.

UPDATE: And yes, Providence did attend the Union-Management Collaboration Jamboree in Denver last week.

Petty

asks for a copy of the budget: broken down by school? Yes
likely June 8 passing City budget; notes that School Committee is holding a hearing after that
244 increase across the city
changing demographic of special ed: on balance an increase of 773 students
increase of low income students of 1367 students
requirements around transportation? 2 miles except for safety concerns that may warrent transportation
asks how many positions that will be cut are currently filled? nearly all
have they been notified? yes
elementary will be better this year than last year?
prioritizing putting additional funds into literacy, elementary, secondary
will elementary be better off? It depends on what you mean by 'better off"
elementary class size down, tutors cut

That's a few more zeros...

Putting Worcester's numbers in perspective (nationally): New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is warning that NYC may have to layoff 8500 teachers next year.

Wow.

Liveblogging City Council: Smith

...opens by quoting, not for the first time, the opening of A Tale of Two Cities.
"there is pain felt"
"as vacancies come up"

For the first time in five years "we're not going to lay any teachers off"
(sorry, Councilor, but you didn't lay any teachers off last year. Granted, that was the first time in a number of years...)

Liveblogging City Council: Petty

"an excellent job"
A question about impact statements: will we get them or do we have them?
Departments are getting them together, potentially as early as tomorrow.

Liveblogging City Council: Clancy

"a shame to see the trend of city services being reduced by some 500 positions over the past decade"
"reflects a great deal of uncertainty"
"what our parks will look like, what our youth will be doing in the summer..."

"to date, the City Manager has done a tremendous job with what he has at hand"

Liveblogging City Council:Rosen

"preserve as many services as possible"
"cannot have too little money, too little revenue, and have the same services"

Liveblogging City Council: Toomey

"moving target"
"working closely with our colleagues on the School Committee to provide the best that we can for the citizens of City of Worcester"
"hope is something that we're all going to have to hang onto"
"a very sad day for Worcester"

Liveblogging City Council: but it ain't over

State revenues are going down, still.
Local aid could go down more.
Then what?
Emergency reserves, deeper cuts, and trash bag fees

Our best bet, the Manager says, are more reforms (that'd be negotiations with the unions).
We could save, the Manager says, 88 jobs, if the unions were willing to take the 75/25 split, a one week furlough, and a "wage proposal" that isn't here specified.