The GAPS school district and many others face budget cuts leading up to the 2023-2024 school year. Looking at the GAPS proposed budget, the school district only has an allotted 122.2 million. This number, however, is uncertain, as it is only an estimate. This comes to a shortfall of 3.6 million from the estimated necessary budget.
According to Ms. Orsborn, the school must prepare for specific cuts, leading to two certified teachers being let go. Each teacher at the school teaches six-and-a-half year-long classes, equivalent to thirteen semester-long courses. That would be a total of 13 classes being dropped. Also, four and a half hours of classified staff will be cut. This means classified staff hours will be removed, including some of the teachers’ classes. Classified staff are not teachers and are a necessary part of a student’s education.
Success classes will also have to be cut. These classes help students catch up and get the credits to graduate high school. These courses are necessary for students who are behind to make up the credits they need to graduate quickly.
The state funding for public schools has been set to 9.9 billion, which is 0.4 billion dollars under the recommended budget of 10.3 billion dollars. This has led to budget cuts around the state as schools are planning the following year’s budget.
At the school board meeting on May 17, the school board took a poll to see their priorities before deciding what the budget would be used on. Many board members voted that raising teachers’ salaries is the priority. The school board also discussed some problems earlier and the year before.
At the meeting on May 24th, the district’s budget committee held a public question session that primarily focused on people’s questions about the increase in budget funds. Many topics were touched upon, and one of the questions answered affirmed that counselors will remain in the budget. This is all that has been talked about at the moment. However, additional meetings are on May 31st, June 12th, and June 26th.
