The Washington suburbs’ two best and largest school systems will lose some luster next fiscal year because of impending budget cuts, but both are trying to spread the pain evenly across programs.
Select budget cuts to Montgomery and Fairfax schools
Montgomery:
13 librarian positions
29 academic intervention teachers
15 literacy coaches
11 middle school staff development teachersFairfax:
130 core high school teachers
80 core middle school teachers
234 core elementary teachers
14 librarian positions
Both Montgomery and Fairfax counties are reducing the number of teachers available for unique learners — students with special needs, or in special magnet and career training programs. Both districts, too, have been forced to trim their library staffs.
In Montgomery, where teachers agreed to forgo a pay raise, larger class sizes will be limited to kindergarten. In Fairfax, however, the class size limit will go up by half a student, requiring each school to cut teachers.
“I think students will notice it most in the secondary schools, where electives might disappear,” Fairfax spokeswoman Mary Shaw said.
Also in Fairfax, 32 positions will be cut from special education programs, and 12 more from career transition services for special-needs students.
Shaw said that specific programs weren’t targeted, but cuts were demanded across the board from both principals and district administrators. Officials in Montgomery asked for across-the-board cuts, as well.
Libraries in both school systems will lose media specialists and assistants, at a time when many consider them more important than ever.
“There’s a perception in some decision makers’ heads that we are what we were in the early 1900s,” said Ann Martin, president of the American Association of School Librarians. “We’re no longer just books, but we’re dealing with resources far more difficult to manage and to make accessible for our diverse students.”
Middle school students in Montgomery will be hit with the phaseout of special programs for students who are learning disabled, saving the district nearly $800,000 in salaries. And about 30 teaching positions focused on academic intervention for troubled students will be cut.
The district’s vaunted middle school magnets are slated to lose some teachers, and a program offering Montgomery College courses for high-achieving students at four county schools will lose its full-time coordinators.
In neither case, however, will students likely notice the effects next year. But what amounts to bare- bones staffing in fiscal 2010 could lead to unrecognizable programs in fiscal 2011, when the budget season is expected to be at least as brutal as this year.
