Work piling up in school offices, unpainted schools, and demoralized staff was the picture painted if proposed cuts to eliminate a $12.1 million deficit go ahead.
Dozens of teachers, support workers and other SD43 employees as well as parents attended a board of education meeting Tuesday night. They wanted to know how cutting 142 jobs throughout the district will affect them and their students.
Some offered alternative - such as reductions to management and travel budgets and a group of non-union employees offered to reduce their own benefits if it meant saving jobs.
But it's teachers who will take the brunt of cuts - approximately 78 teachers will be eliminated with reorganizations of staff development, international education, student services for special needs, the middle school hub program and secondary school libraries.
Fewer clerical staff (12.0), fewer custodians and facilities maintenance workers (17), fewer IT workers, (2) and even fewer managers and administrators (11) were itemized as the way forward for getting to a balanced budget.
COMMUNICATION PLANNED
By May 7, the budget is expected to be passed but most employees who are slated lose their jobs have already been approached or soon will be, according to School Superintendent Tom Grant.
For Coquitlam Teacher's Association president Teresa Grandinetti, the cuts are devastating, the budget situation the worst she's seen in 25 years, and she was quick to describe the impact of the reductions when school starts again in September.
"It is not possible to do the same with less, and next year you will be asking teachers and their CUPE colleagues to produce the same results with less support, less supplies, fewer teachers while at the same time increasing the number of students in classrooms and increasing teacher workload," Grandinetti said.
Programs losing the most teachers will be staff development, responsible for organizing learning teams and professional development (12.6 jobs) and international education (17 jobs) which will pay for fewer teachers at the elementary and middle school level from fees foreign students pay. Most international ed students now attend secondary school because of changing demographics, according to Patricia Gartland, so fewer teachers are needed for the younger age groups.
The district will also lose four skill development teachers, six teachers who work with students with learning disabilities (although the cuts will be more likely a reduction of hours at several schools rather than entire jobs, to spread the pain), 2 for gifted at middle and secondary, 1.7 for student services and a learning support teacher for the hub program. Also hit, are English Language Learners, the equivalent of 4.5 teachers who work with these students will be cut.
"Making reductions in a district is never easy," Grant acknowledged, as he laid out the cuts that will likely have to be made in the coming weeks.
CUPE local 561 president Dave Ginter said maintenance at schools would be reduced while work piles up in clerk's offices because, in addition to staff cuts, the district is cutting draw time for clerical work by 50%. This draw time allows for more clerical workers, especially at busy times, such as the beginning and the end of the school year. "That will be the impact," Ginter said, "the work won't get done."
He also said laying off people can mean shelling out more in severance costs and he wondered what the savings would, in fact, be.
MORE INPUT SOUGHT
Meanwhile, District Parent Advisory Council chair Heidi Hass Gable also expressed concerns about the district's ongoing financial situation. She said parents should be included in future budget discussions so they aren't hit with surprises.
Hass Gable said parents are also worried about future funding issues, such as the reliance on International Education, which generates about $15 million in fees. She said the province may be changing the program, and Hass Gable also wanted to know whether the district is properly funded for its future employee benefits.
Dozens of people, including members of the media, attended the meeting, many of them Tweeting out comments and sharing information online.
Presenters included librarians, who said secondary libraries are already squeezed and can't afford to lose more librarian time, and the Coquitlam Management Group, non-union staff who work in human resources, payroll, and purchasing. President Kimberley Wakil suggested the district could save money with more bulk purchasing and wellness programs to improve attendance and she said her group would be willing to make changes to their own benefits to save jobs (six excluded management positions are currently on the chopping block, however, at least one is a retirement that won't be replaced. Director of student services Dave Taylor is retiring and his job will be taken over by an assistant superintendent.)
LESS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
CTA first vice-president Chris King expressed similar concerns about the gutting of the staff development department - the removal of 12.6 positions, leaving six coordinators to support professional development and teaching and learning among educators.
"When you take those out of staff development, what have you got left," King asked. "It's huge," he added.
Grant said the district leadership team would take the suggestions and comments into consideration before next Tuesday, when the budget will again be the topic of discussion.
Port Moody trustee Keith Watkins also suggested he's open to a forensic audit. "We have questions, too," Watkins said.
However, board chair Melissa Hyndes told The News that a decision will have to wait until the budget is passed.
Noting that the aim of the cuts - in addition to whittling down a $12.1 million deficit - is to spread the pain throughout the district so that one school or department isn't hit more than another, she said the cuts to the staff development department are significant.
But she expected that many teachers would still progress in their learning, "Teachers love what they do and they are motivated to learn," and she said vulnerable and special needs students would still get the services they need, even with the changes and reductions in support hours.
However, she said cuts need to be made: "Every part of the district needs to be looked at to see where we can make reductions, hopefully not permanent reductions," Hyndes said.
Grant, meanwhile, acknowledged that the cuts would be difficult, especially for those losing their jobs.
"My characterization its probably heart and gut wrenching. You deal with it from two perspectives: slightly reduced services for kids across the system but it is a major impact on any staff who lose their job or don't get recalled or don't get the opportunity to be the best they can, the passion in this district to support the learner is unbelievable."
VULNERABLE KIDS
And he said there will have to be changes to a new hub program started last year at three middle schools to support at-risk and vulnerable kids.
Grant said the hub program, which provides after school programs for 1,400 students, won't be expanded as planned at Minnekhada, Maillard and Banting middle schools, but it will be retained. Three youth workers at those schools who are not part of the hub will be let go, along with two community school coordinators, to reduce costs and the program "won't be quite as rich," he said, "But we'll be able to keep it going."
Change are in the works, as well, for programs serving students with behavior issues.
Programs at four schools serving these students will be cut to two, one each at Birchland and Dr. Charles Best, and he said the hours of an SEA who works with the Teaching and Evaluation Centre will be cut.
As well, five teaching assistant positions will be removed from the district.
However, he said the cuts won't effect students with learning challenges working out of the so-called T and E Centre. They will still get help for half a day to learn coping mechanisms for doing better at school, and low-enrollment made it necessary to consolidate the behavior programs at two schools.
On the good news side of the ledger, the district is on track to meeting its goal of cutting $5 million to offset a deficit this year and will still have $3.1 million in Learning Improvement Funds to support special needs students in the classroom next year.
