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Officials in the Granville School District announced April 14 the names of the teachers retained through concessions made by the Granville Teacher’s Association for a salary freeze.
The agreement which saved the district more than $200,000 and included concessions on healthcare costs saved five teachers when district officials agreed to readdress the budget and find accompanying cuts.
Granville Superintendent Mark Bessen the job retention recommendations would come from Principal Scott Bojanich and would be based on the class schedule demands of students for the 2011-2012 school year.
Social studies teacher Mike Anderson, special education teacher Ann Brustkern, science teacher Leah Liebacher, English teacher Ann O’Brien and business teacher Terry Wheeler will be retained.
Reduction in force letters went out to another eight teachers and to 15 members of the support staff; those individuals will not be returning to work in the fall.
“These retentions helped to balance our programs and the departments were also considered for the volume of electives the children would sign up for so they can have fewer study halls and more opportunities for students to take a valuable class every period,” Bessen said.
Bessen said no additional reinstatements were planned unless they resulted from a need based on unforeseen circumstances such as a surge in a particular area of the student population.
“It’s been a difficult process this year, but we’re proud that teachers, administration and the board worked hard to make this the best possible outcome considering the circumstances,” Superintendent Mark Bessen said.
Those concessions can do little going forward if the state cuts aid to the school again during the next year. Short of a restructuring of the school aid system, Bessen said tough times remain ahead.
“We’re disappointed to lose some very talented educators that added value to our school and provided strong and caring programs for our children. We hope that somewhere down the road the state will learn that they can’t use whatever formula they use and treat all schools the same because it’s affecting real lives and opportunities for our children statewide,” Bessen said.
Bessen said moves painted as cost cutting at the state level in fact simply pushed costs for education down to the local level particularly in places which could afford that additional burden least, like Granville, and other rural schools.
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