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School leaders upset by state budget cuts, hold rally in Richmond Date published: 1/20/2010
BY CHELYEN DAVIS
RICHMOND-- School superintendents across Virginia are considering laying off teachers, increasing class sizes and cutting programs to cope with state budget cuts that they called "potentially devastating."In a news conference in Richmond, members of the Virginia School Superintendents Association said proposed cuts in state funding threaten students' success, and implored lawmakers to consider ways to mitigate the impact of cuts on schools. "We will reach a point where we will not have the staff to do the job we have been given effectively," said Milton Liverman, president of the superintendents' group and superintendent of Suffolk County schools. "Most of us have already reduced everything that does not have a significant impact on the classroom. We ask that budget decision-makers not make their decisions based on presupposed notions about school operations or a one-size-fits-all solution." The 2011-2012 budget that the former Democratic governor, Tim Kaine, proposed before leaving office last week contains about $2 billion in budget cuts across agencies. For schools, part of the proposed reductions--more than $750 million--is a cap on the number of support staff that the state will pay for, a permanent change that school officials oppose. They want to wait for a study of the staffing-ratio issue to be completed, and said current staffing standards are already too low. If Republicans reject, as they have said they will, tax increases that Kaine also proposed, then budget cuts, including those to public education, could double. About half of the state's school districts have responded to a survey about how they plan to deal with proposed budget cuts. Almost all that responded said they're considering cutting staff. Nearly half would cut salaries, and at least 46 percent would eliminate or reduce some incentive programs, such as remedial summer school or programs for 4-year-olds or at-risk students. The superintendents also said that schools are already strained under a pile of state and federal mandates, standards and bureaucracy. They want the state to postpone several new mandates--such as new requirements for testing, new finance and economic class requirements, and SOL revisions--until revenues improve.
If we let the state government cut budgets to the schools our children will pay the price in the long run. This is very short sighted of the state, the state needs to cut back on its spending for earmarks, road construction,and other services that hurt the budget. I don't know about you but I would rather deal with traffic than to have my childrens education suffer because of the states short sightedness and there overspending.
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