Letter: Don’t blame board for budget struggle (March 1)
I would like to remind everyone that our state is in terrible financial shape. Individual school sites must have budgets in place and submitted to the district by a certain date. The district has to have its budget in place and submitted to the state by a certain date. Our local officials do not have the luxury of waiting around for the State of California to pass a budget.
I didn’t attend the budget meeting, but I did watch the reports on the news and read articles in the Tribune. What I saw were hundreds of angry residents, MUSD employees and supporters. Here’s the thing that the Madera Unified School District Trustees are not telling you: They are losing just as much sleep over these decisions as we are.
They understand peoples’ lives are on the chopping block. They understand the hardships families will face with the closing of schools and reduced busing. They don’t want to fire or lay off anyone. They don’t have a choice. Unfortunately, California’s financial stability has been run into the ground. Our local officials may not have caused the problem, but they and we have to help clean up the mess. The Trustees are not the bad guys here.
There are a couple of ways for the public to be involved in the decision-making process at school sites. Parents can get involved with the school site councils at their children’s schools or volunteer on the schools’ parent club. These are excellent ways to learn what is going on and what will happen in the future.
Laura Gutile,
Madera
Laura, you can defend them all you want.
However in light of deep budget cuts, (and many peoples jobs), giving school trutees a pay raise and thinking it will all blow over or that parents and teachers will not notice is just wrong. It seems more like; ” I’m going to get as much cash as I can and then leave Madera and their schools high and dry”. The right thing they could have done was to “Man/Woman” up and say they would not recieve a pay raise and would take a 3% cut to keep a teacher or service for students. So who are they really looking to help? Not you child that is for sure.
As a teacher who has lost their job at MUSD, due to budget cuts, I can state that even the way they want to close Dixieland school is just underhanded back room politics. That just lights a fire under me like you wouldn’t believe, and I have no ties to anyone at Dixieland!
If they wanted to really keep teachers and schools open they could do things like a 4 day school week. Turn Madison into a middle school grades 5-8, and send the younger pre-k-4 grade kids to Alpha.
Charge a flat rate for bus transport from families, many districts do.
Other than the batrooms and lunchroom, teachers for the most part clean their own rooms, so why not administrators too?
Redirect funds marked for new pool construction and for buying new vans back to the classroom.
Having been at PTA, School site, ELAC and other parent/ teacher groups…many are just “patted on the head and not listened to by administration”.
SO my advice: Parents get to every school meeting and start standing up for all students, not just your child. Teachers, I love teaching…but I will say STRIKE!
I will be right there on the lines with you.
California needs to lead…education has suffered long enough under only “testing” … it is time to get back to teaching other subjects so our children again have a passion for learning more than just how to fill in a bubble.