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School Board weighs pleas for more help
By BARBARA BEHRENDT, Times Staff Writer INVERNESS -- Ask school principals, teachers and staff what they need to better serve the district's 15,000 plus students, and they frequently respond by saying they need more help. They need deans to help discipline students in the high schools, assessment specialists to better prepare students for tests and behavior specialists in the younger grades to help children with emotional problems. On Tuesday, the School Board discussed all those needs and how they might be able to make some of them come true. But the limiting factor is money. Because Tuesday's session was a workshop, the board could take no action. But the majority of the members favored adding needed positions as soon as the financial picture becomes clearer and favored improving the district's staffing plan. That plan sets the number and type of each employee allowed at each school, using a formula based on the number of students. District staff members detailed how many positions may move from school to school based on student numbers but also talked about requests from principals for more workers. From secretaries, administrators and curriculum specialists to deans, purchasing agents and registrars, the requests totaled more than $633,000. Board member Sandra "Sam" Himmel pushed to get more counselors at both Lecanto and Citrus high schools for the beginning of the new school year, based on enrollment numbers. But administrators said those numbers are projections, and Superintendent David Hickey said he wanted to be sure enough students arrive in August to justify any new positions. Another position not on the list was the hiring of two behavioral specialists at the elementary school level. Board chairwoman Pat Deutschman said that she heard that request from school employees. "That's a serious need," agreed board member Patience Nave. "The elementary schools are having a lot of difficulties. . . . We have some critically emotionally disturbed little children." Board members said that in special round table discussions last week with teachers and staff they heard real concerns about some of those troubled children. Board member Ginger Bryant said some separate place needs to be provided for such youngsters who act up since they are too young to be sent to the district's alternative school. "I don't care where they're put. I just want them out of the classroom," Bryant said. Deutschman said there is such a place, usually the chair in the front office of each school by the secretary. Hickey said he understood all those needs but he reminded the board that last year they did not meet their student projections and lost more than $700,000 in expected state funding because of that. "It's a cost factor," he said. "It cost us $700,000 to $800,000 last year. I just want to caution you, we've been bit and we don't want to be bit again." Board members also reminded their staff that they had voted unanimously to add a guidance counselor position at the Renaissance Center. Administrators also detailed a plan to change the way the district handles groundskeeping duties. They are exploring creating in-house teams that would travel around their region of the county to keep up school lawns and landscaping and separate workers to maintain school athletic fields. James Hughes, executive director of support services, said doing such work in-house would be cheaper than contracting out the jobs and would free up existing custodians to do more in-school tasks. That might help with some of the requests school principals have made for additional custodians in their schools, Hughes said. The district now uses custodians and some outside contractors to keep up school grounds. Further discussions about the new positions are expected as the district moves through the budgeting process this summer. School finance director Sam Hurst told the board Tuesday that he is never completely comfortable with the financial picture because conditions change regularly, but this year he is more uncomfortable than usual. "We still don't have any firm numbers," he said.
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