Dozens of Elkhart teachers on way out through layoffs, incentives due to state cuts

By the end of the year, ECS officials said eight secondary teachers will have been given layoff notifications. In addition, 30 teachers are expected to accept an early retirement incentive being offered by the district, and 10 more are expected to take personal leave incentives. Despite reduction, Superintendent Mark Mow said the overall impact on classes should be minimal.

This year ECS had to cut $3.9 million from its general fund, the majority of which is used to pay for employee salaries and benefits. In March, after having already cut roughly $3 million from the general fund, the district reached an agreement with teachers that tentatively made up the final $900,000.

The agreement included the early retirement incentive, which consists of up to five annual payments of $5,000 made to teachers' individual VEBA post-retirement health insurance accounts up to age 65. That incentive was only made available to teachers already eligible for retirement -- those with 15 years or more of experience with ECS and at least 55 years old. The agreement also included an incentive for teachers taking unpaid personal leaves. Those teachers will receive $5,000 contributions for health insurance from the district for up to three years.

The incentives would save money for the district only if enough employees participated. Mow said he was happy with the response, which was enough to keep the number of layoff notices in the single digits.

"I'm disappointed that we have to reduce any staff," he said, "but we've worked hard to minimize that number and I think we've had good cooperation from everyone to try and make that happen."

Doug Thorne, director of employee and student relations, said many of the retirements are coming from the elementary schools -- so many that the district will likely need to fill positions with current and possibly even new employees. At the secondary level, however, scheduling changes that will be implemented next year to compensate for budget cuts, as well as declining enrollment, mean the district will retain fewer teachers.

Next year Elkhart's secondary schools will go to a seven-period day with teachers teaching six of the periods. Currently, the middle schools have six periods with teachers teaching five, Central High School has seven periods with teachers teaching five and Memorial High School has block scheduling.

Mow said the move is a proactive way to create staffing efficiency as it requires fewer teachers and creates the opportunity to share staff between buildings. The move will not impact schools' start times, and Mow said students will ultimately receive more minutes in their particular classes over the course of the year.

Thorne emphasized that while more than 40 teachers may be leaving, some of those positions will be filled. The total number of positions the district is reducing when all is said and done hasn't yet been determined. Mow said that class sizes won't be significantly impacted and estimated they may increase on average by one student per classroom.

There's also the chance that the number of teachers expected to be laid off next year will go down before the board takes final action in June. Mow and Thorne said there's still time for teachers with secured positions to request transfers or resign on their own accord. These occurrences open up the possibility that a teacher who has been given a layoff notification will get to keep their job.

The full savings of the reductions won't be fully known until planning begins for the 2011 budget. Mow said the savings will be helpful in the event additional cuts are made in state-provided tuition next year, and officials plan to meet with teachers in August to discuss financial matters, including the possibility of additional budget cuts.

ECS is the second district to announce teacher layoffs this year. Last month Concord Community Schools announced it was cutting 11 positions for the 2010-11 school year.