500 Sonoma County teachers get layoff warnings

More than 200 tenured teachers across Sonoma County have received notices that they may not have a job to return to next fall.

In addition to those layoff notices, 300 teachers who do not have tenure have been told they may lose their jobs.

Friday was dubbed “Pink Friday” by many school staffers in California because it marked the legal deadline for districts to notify tenured teachers that their jobs are at risk. Any of the pink slips can be rescinded by May 15 if districts find a way to keep the jobs.

Even with the hope of federal stimulus dollars coming to save some jobs, many educators said the financial climate and budget cuts being contemplated are without precedent.

“We have never seen it this bad before. Never,” said Melanie Blake, a 25-year veteran teacher at Sonoma Valley High School who rallied Friday in support of teachers targeted for possible layoff. “It causes a lot of stress for teachers, and it makes it a lot harder to present a real positive climate for our kids.”

Layoff notices were issued to 26,500 teachers statewide, more than 2½ times the number issued last spring, said state Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell. In addition, 15,000 administrators, secretaries, bus drivers and janitors were issued pink-slip warnings.

Kindergarten through 12th-grade education in California is facing $8 billion in funding cuts over the next year. Because 80percent to 85 percent of districts’ costs are personnel, pink slips were issued in unheard of numbers this week.

Being told your future is in doubt is not easy — even if many of your colleagues are in the same situation and there is hope the decision will be overturned, said Josh Cutler, a fifth-grade teacher at Rohnert Park’s Evergreen Elementary School.

Cutler and his wife, Meagan, a kindergarten teacher at Rohnert Park’s Hahn Elementary, both received pink slips.

“I wouldn’t wish this on anybody,” Cutler said. “This is my wife’s second time getting pink-slipped. We have a daughter and a mortgage.”

“Everything is up in the air. We could get hired back next year, or one of us could — that is the hardest part for all of us teachers, things are changing all the time,” he said. “We have to live our life.”

Cutler, who spoke from his home after a day teaching 33fifth-graders, said that despite the gloomy outlook, “I love being in my classroom. I love teaching the curriculum. I love the people I work with. I get to be with kids.”

He also said his story is not entirely unique: “It’s not just me. We all have stories.”

In the Cotati-Rohnert Park school district, 42 of the nearly 55 notices were given to classroom teachers, including 32 at the elementary level.

If those cuts stand, classroom sizes for kindergarten through fifth grade will increase to 28students, Superintendent Barbara Vrankovich said.

The district, the county’s third-largest, is facing the double hit of state cuts and significantly declining enrollment.

In Petaluma, the district issued pink slips for the equivalent of about 31 full-time jobs.

“It’s terrible,” said Kenilworth Junior High physical education teacher Ted Russo. “I’ve never seen it before in my 17 years of teaching.”

“Our hope is that we will be calling people back,” he said. “It’s very fluid right now.”

Santa Rosa schools issued seven layoff notices: Five teachers and an administrator at Lewis Adult School and the assistant principal at Lewis Opportunity School.

Twenty-six tenured teachers in the district opted for an early retirement deal.

The California Teachers Association is pressuring state lawmakers to keep their hands off federal stimulus dollars that come into California for local districts, said Andy Witthohn, chapter services consultant for the CTA.

Union members gathered Friday afternoon in protest at the state building on D Street in downtown Santa Rosa where Assembly Members Noreen Evans, D-Santa Rosa, and Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, were meeting.

Sen. Pat Wiggins, D-Santa Rosa, later joined about two dozen teachers on the sidewalk who were holding signs and waving to passing motorists.

“This is a very bad situation,” Wiggins said. “People are being laid off all over.”

But she said she doesn’t know what can be done.

“There’s going to be a huge deficit in education and it’s going to be awful, because we can’t, we don’t have, the wherewithal to do something about it,” she said.

Earlier in the day, Witthohn offered some hope to teachers.

“Look guys, there is going to be some federal stimulus. We want to make sure that money is not hijacked by the governor and the Legislature,” Witthohn said. “The money that is coming for education needs to go to education.”

Many officials are holding out hope that the federal aid may allow districts to rescind pink slips before the May 15 deadline.

“People understand that we are not just crying wolf anymore,” said Blake, the Sonoma Valley High teacher. said. “The wolf is at the door.”

(Staff Writer Clark Mason contributed to this story. Staff Writer Kerry Benefield writes an education blog at extracredit.pressdemocrat.com. She can be reached at 526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com.)