Summer school to drop to four days

Hillsborough officials are proposing a four-day summer school program as they look to cut another $26 million out of this year's budget.

School Board discussed a plan to close all schools and district offices for one workday during the seven weeks of summer at a workshop Tuesday. The district would save at least $1.2 million from the move. Employees would save on gas and other expenses associated with coming to work.

School officials acknowledged this could be a hardship for working parents, who would have to look for alternative daycare options. Hillsborough Out-of-School-Time, a daycare program, enrolls around 3,000 students on average during the summer, and thousands more attend academic summer programs.

But the budget picture is bleak. Based on current state revenue figures, Hillsborough school officials project that they could have to cut another $29 million out of this year's budget, on top of the latest $26-million hit. If so, they could be absorbing as much as $100 million in budget cuts over two years.

District officials are looking into a wide range of cost-saving cuts. High on the list: No longer allowing teachers to postpone their retirement for three additional years after participating in the state's deferred retirement program. Although relatively few teachers are affected, school officials anticipate savings of more than $4.5 million, because these teachers are among the highest paid.

The district also plans to look into the way it allocates support staff to middle and high schools, custodial assignments and other positions determined by the numbers of students at a school.

Comments

Yesssssss! Now I can skip that one class I hate all year long, attend for 4 days in the summer and get the same credit!

YAHOOOOOOOOOO!

[John]

OK, administrators, district level employees and school board members, how about a 10% cut in your pay until this economic downturn is settled. Or maybe it would be "better" to cut some custodians pay to the point where they can have better health care on welfare. Put your money where your mouth is or shut up.

[Alex]

As a graduate of our rather deplorable school system, you need to rethink your stance. At our larger HS and more troubled MS we need them to help retain some kind of control. Since a lot of parents (of all races) don't decide to raise their children, someone has too.

Our schools are the only thing that advance any locality's economy to the next level. So if we ever want to be something more then a credit card call center alley, let's invest in some real schools.

[sentinel]

Maybe cutting out the bountiful supply of assitant principals would be the way to go. Put them in the classroom instead and less administrative puff.