Home » High School Articles » Teachers Bear First Impact of School Finance Woes
Teachers Bear First Impact of School Finance Woes
Last week’s ruling by a Travis County district judge in the latest school finance lawsuit will have a direct effect on classroom teachers long before students see changes.
/24-7PressRelease.com/ -- Judge John Dietz ruled that the current school funding system is unconstitutional, and gave state officials until October 1, 2005, to come up with a new system. On that date, state funding to schools will be stopped if the legislature has not corrected the constitutional shortcomings of the current system. In other words, the legislature will have to enact a new funding system in the next year or Texas public schooling will essentially come to a halt next October.
The state has already announced that it intends to appeal, but a decision is not likely to come before the legislature goes back into session next January. Couple that with the fact that legislators have been trying to agree on a new funding system for months and are not even close to agreeing on anything, and you have the seeds for a very stress-filled spring and summer for public school teachers.
Next February, when local school districts begin to make staffing and hiring decisions, they will likely have no idea what their funding will look like or how much money they will have for 2005. Personnel budgets are by far the single largest percentage of any school budget, and classroom teachers are a huge chunk of that number. It is nearly impossible for a school district to cut substantial amounts of money from their budget without looking at teacher staffing. The uncertainty over 2005-2006 school year funding will lead school districts to staff as lean as they can get away with, and to prepare to let additional staff go if necessary. Different districts will do this in different ways, but Pamela Parker, an attorney with the Teacher Advocates of Texas, says that some of the things you can expect to see around the state are:
• high numbers of non-renewals of probationary teaching contracts;
• delays in hiring replacements for retiring or resigning teachers;
• strengthened reduction-in-force (layoff) policies;
• contract clauses that try to condition the contract on receipt of state funding;
• delays in the issuance of teaching contracts;
• early retirement incentives.
The result of this will be job uncertainty for all new teachers, all teachers with probationary contracts, all teachers in special areas programs, and all teachers who are planning to move. Additionally, the teachers who remain can expect to see increased workloads in what is already a crowded workday.
Teacher Advocates of Texas provides public school teachers with employment rights information and advocacy. For further information call 1-888-206-3439 or go to www.tatx.com.
---
Press release service and press release distribution provided by http://www.24-7pressrelease.com |
|
|
Press Release Contact Information:
Pamela Parker
Teacher Advocates of Texas, LLC
Director
PMB 162, 11900 Metric Blvd., Ste J
Austin, TX
USA 78758
Voice: (512)587-8182
|
|
|
|
|
| HIGH SCHOOL ARCHIVE SEARCH |
|
|
| |
|
|
Advertise With Us |
About Us |
Contact Us