The Pleasant Valley School District continues to adjust the number of possible furloughs it needs to balance a budget.

The furloughs and volunteer retirements have been sought due to declining enrollment numbers and a $3 million deficit despite a 4.7% tax increase.

The school board passed a resolution April 7 stating it intended to furlough up to 16 professional employees that provide direct instruction to students, two administrative staff, and one professional employees that does not provide direct instruction and is not administrative staff.

The district also intended to not renew the employment of up to nine temporary professional employees, such as substitute teachers.

At the meeting on Thursday night, a new resolution was passed that reduced the number of furloughs down to 10 professional employees, one administrative staff member and one professional employee that does not provide direct instruction.

As for temporary professional staff, that number was dropped to eight people (seven employees and one administrative person).

Steps to reduction

Superintendent James Konrad said reducing transportation costs was the first area the administration looked at to try to balance the budget.

“Teachers were the last thing we looked at,” he said.

He acknowledged that losing teachers is devastating, but enrollment has dropped 30% since 2016-17 while employment has decreased 17%.

“We have to do something to move forward,” he said.

The school district has also implemented a restructuring of the Special Education Department.

This year, the department consists of Director of Special Education Julie Harris, three supervisors, one education consultant, one transition coordinator and one licensed clinical social worker.

The new structure eliminates the supervisor level and promotes one to assistant director, changes one to an education consultant, and furloughs the third person. The person to be furloughed is Fawn Meli, who was hired in November 2020.

The resolution also listed the furlough of an administrative position, which is Pleasant Valley Intermediate School Assistant Principal Annette Schaffer. She was just hired in October 2021.

The resolution referred to the realignment of grades as being the reason behind the furlough. With third grade moving to PVIS, the elementary school will no longer need two assistant principals, so one of those positions is being eliminated. The resolution did not say if one of the current assistant principals will move to the intermediate school.

Retirement incentives

The school board also revised the conditional retirement incentive memorandum for professional employees.

The original document required a minimum of 25 employees with 15 years of continuous professional service to the school district as eligible for the retirement incentive by March 7. The revised document lowered it to 15 employees by March 14. Twenty-one employees took the incentive.

The revised document also increased the percentage of base salary that the professional employees would receive from 35% to 50%.

The support staff were also offered a retirement incentive. Sixteen employees opted to take it earlier this month.

Resignations

At the meeting on Thursday, the school board also accepted the retirements and resignations of nine employees.

• Retirement Incentive, PVEA 2022: Joyce Green, reading specialist at PVES; Cynthia Lizzio, reading specialist at PVMS; Julie Kresge, teacher of gifted students at PVIS; and Kristine Meckes, health and physical education at PVMS. Meckes had been assigned to the Pleasant Valley Cyber Academy, but was reassigned to health and physical education at the April 7 meeting.

• Retirement: George Curcio, districtwide security, effective June 2; and Denise Keiling, PVES teacher, end of school year.

• Resignations: Miranda Brooks, German teacher, PVHS, end of school year; Rickie Kuntzman Jr., custodian, PVHS, April 22; and Jenna Rudolf, PVHS senior class adviser, effective April 20.

Ultimately, the school district is seeking the elimination of 40 positions either through furloughs and nonrenewals of temporary employees, or by not filling vacant positions. These positions include:

• 12 special education positions,

• two school counselors,

• five reading specialists,

• two math specialists,

• five secondary math positions,

• seven reading teachers at the middle school,

• two sixth-grade teachers,

• two instructional support positions,

• one English teacher at the high school,

• one gifted teacher position,

• one Spanish teacher.

Of these 40 positions, there have been 16 people retire or resign since January. They include: four special education instructors, one counselor, four reading specialists, one secondary math teacher, one reading specialist at the middle school, two instructional support people, two teachers of gifted students, and one Spanish teacher.

Since January, 42 people in other departments not listed here have resigned or retired. They include 12 teachers, 16 paraprofessionals, and 14 support staff that include monitors, custodians, maintenance people, secretaries, and food service employees.

A few of the support staff positions were filled with new hires or part-time paraprofessionals promoted to full-time.