District doesn’t plan to fill open positions

The Newport-Mesa Unified School District is expected to have fewer teachers this fall, in what Deputy Superintendent Paul Reed said was an effort to loosen funds in response to a higher-paying contract adopted by the district’s teachers.

The district, which so far this year has had 13 teachers announce their retirements, does not plan to fill most of the positions when school resumes in September. Reed and other administrators said the district had no plans to lay off teachers, but planned to reduce its staff by attrition to help pay for a 19% increase in teacher salaries over the next three years.

Newport-Mesa, according to Reed, had already considered decreasing the number of teachers before the union negotiated its new contract, since the district had slightly more teachers per student than the county average. However, he said that with salaries set to increase, the money the district saved through retirements — about $84,000 for the average teacher — now has a ready destination.

“It is definitely going right back into teacher salaries,” Reed said.

Chuck Hinman, the assistant superintendent of secondary education, described the downsizing of teachers as a “tightening of the belt.” He said some teachers might be taking on more students in the fall than they did in previous years, although Reed and teachers union President Jim Rogers — citing a predicted drop in student enrollment — said the numbers wouldn’t be definite until September.

The Newport-Mesa teachers union’s contract stipulates that a full-time secondary teacher can have no more than 180 students per day, although it doesn’t specify how many students can be in a particular class. Rogers, who taught in Newport-Mesa for more than three decades before becoming union president, said he could sympathize with his colleagues if they felt overwhelmed in the fall.

“Being a secondary teacher myself, I can say that 180 is a big load,” he said.

In addition to saving money through attrition, Newport-Mesa may save more than $800,000 this year by cutting or trimming a number of programs. Administrators held a strategic review earlier this year to determine whether the district was spending its money efficiently, and came up with a list of expenses, including English-learner programs and mentors for new principals, that could be eliminated or funded by state dollars.

“You try and buy the best education for the dollar you have,” Reed said.