D.C. schools officials said Tuesday that most of the 750 employees who were told this week that their positions are being cut will find new jobs in the system. “I want to be absolutely clear that these are not layoffs,” said Jason Kamras, the chief of D.C. Public Schools’ Office of Human Capital.
“Excessing is very different from a layoff. An excess is the elimination of a position at a school, but not the end of one’s employment with the school system.”
About 700 employees received excess letters in 2010, with 79 percent of Washington Teachers’ Union members who received those notices finding another job in the school system, Kamras said. About 850 received excess letters in 2009.
On Monday, D.C. school officials said they told 660 teachers and support staff that their jobs were being eliminated for the coming school year, blaming declining enrollment and budget issues.
But The Washington Examiner reported that jobs were cuts at some schools expecting more students and extra funding next year.
Kamras declined to discuss specifics about individual schools or programs.
He said many of the teachers and school staffers who received excess notices work at schools where the academic program is changing.
“Imagine a school that has a French foreign language program and they decide to move to a Spanish foreign language program,” he explained. “The skills of the French foreign language program teacher will no longer be necessary at that particular school, but will certainly be necessary at other schools in the school system.”
Sources at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts told The Examiner on Monday that at least 13 positions had been eliminated.
Kamras said the school system will list openings on its internal website for employees. It also will hold hiring fairs for teachers and principals.
Teachers union members who can’t find positions by end of the summer and have strong performance ratings will be able to take a $25,000 buyout, he said. They also can be placed at a school for a year with full salary and benefits while looking for a permanent position.
