MIDDLEBURY -- Middlebury School Board members will decide by the end of next month whether to reduce the teaching force by 11.5 positions, lay off aides and cut all freshman sports teams and some middle school teams and clubs.
Superintendent Jim Conner presented a list of suggested cuts at Tuesday's school board meeting to make up for what he said is a total loss of $2.6 million in funding for the corporation, about 10 percent of the district's general fund. Gov. Mitch Daniels announced at the end of last year that he would cut $300 million -- about 4.5 percent -- from state funding for K-12 education for 2010 due to a shortfall in revenue.
But Conner said Middlebury has been hit on other levels. Between the effects of increased property tax caps, the loss of facility appeals which had been previously granted, a $184 million loss in assessed property values and the cut in state funding, Middlebury needs to figure out how to save about $2.6 million.
The elimination of 11.5 teaching positions is done by not replacing eight teachers who are retiring or leaving, cutting two positions that had been approved for adding next year because of growth in enrollment and the non-renewal of a Spanish middle school teacher and an elementary special education teacher.
Four high school aide positions and one middle school aide position would be eliminated, according to the proposal, as well as two part-time custodians.
From the high school, Conner proposed the elimination of boys' and girls' freshman basketball, freshman football, freshman volleyball, the pep band, intramural sports, several clubs and several assistant positions. The middle school would lose seventh and eighth grade B teams for football, girls' and boys' basketball and volleyball, sixth grade A and B teams for girls' and boys' basketball, sixth grade cheerleading and the Aerospace Club. Conner said the district would cut all elementary extracurricular activities except for the Special Olympics.
Conner said no sport or program would be eliminated completely, and freshmen can participate on junior varsity and varsity teams and club sports.
Conner said the proposed cuts could increase class sizes and hurt the schools' high graduate rate. But he said he sees deeper cuts in state funding down the road and warned that if the district has to cut more next year, it will have to look at cutting a counselor position, eliminating the art program and Reading Recovery in the elementary schools, cutting back on physical education in the elementary schools, cutting programming in the expressive arts at the middle school and high school, cutting administrators and closing an elementary school.
"What we've done so far is Middlebury schools had very little fat," Conner said. "There is no fat. What I've been talking about here, I'm cutting into the muscle. And what we're going to do next year is we're going to start amputating. We're going to start amputating, and people are going to feel it. They're going to feel it deep."
Conner asked the board to think about the proposed cuts and vote on them at the April 28 meeting.