ns

is this really the time to be spending 2 million for renovation of preschool for the pact program.

This is the LOS ALTOS school district thatis sending out 45 pink slips -- NOT Mountain View Whisman.

One more time - your wrong

I WAS REFERRING TO THIS FACT NOT THE MVLA PINK SLIPS

But the Mountain View Whisman School District faces the largest cut of all: $2.6 million through 2010. As a revenue limit district, it receives most of its funding from the state, unlike the other two districts which rely on local property taxes for funding.

Our teachers are getting pink slips, our poorest preschool children are displaced and one has to wonder why? Mike said it best: "Why when we are facing such deep budget cuts, are we allocating 2 MILLION DOLLARS in upgrades for PACT? (oh that's right, PACT needs a garden) And I still want to know where all the operational funds are coming from, did the district find some extra money?" TRAGIC!!!

Sandy, MVWSD is not pink-slipping teachers this year. Maybe next year. The pink slips are in Los Altos School District and the MVLA High School District Adult School.

Education budgets are the most convoluted thing imaginable, full of restrictions beyond the control of the district administration. If the $2M that is being used to renovate space for PACT cannot by law be used for anything else to offset the budget cuts from the state (most likely true), then why does it make more sense to leave the $2M just sitting in some building fund and have Castro be overcrowded?

And I know everyone will say that that's what the district gets for being "stupid" enough to close Slater, but consider that the main problem here is the same one that lots of districts face now. Since they are always scrambling with budget issues, they don't have the flexibility of keeping schools open during enrollment dips. This happens to other district (Los Altos and Bullis, for example; and Palo Alto I believe had to spend a bunch of money a few years back to buy back a campus that they sold to the city back in the 70's or 80's so they could open a third middle school). Pre-Prop 13, the school districts probably had fewer students since the population here was lower, but they had lots more small school sites. They had the budget flexibility & spending authority to weather the ebbs and flows of enrollment. Now they don't, they have to spend as the state dictates, and react to whatever their enrollment and budget look like 3 years out, and if either changes unexpectedly, they are toast. And they did have demographic studies done before closing Slater, and none of them predicted the current enrollment bump.

Blame the adminstrators all you want, the problem is our broken educational finance system and screwy property tax system in California.

Actually, one more time, the California and Federal government are in the process of passing legislation to okay school districts "reallocating" funds because we are in a uniquely devastating economic crisis. What if this goes through and instead of using our funds for the basic educational needs of all our children and teachers, we spend our money on a choice program??????? We should definitely get answers to this before the new garden plots are ordered. For once could we please have some foresight??

wouldnt it be wise to spread pact teachers so all students benefit rather than give into pact. At the cost of 2 million. I feel all the kids would be better off than the pact kids having a garden. Come on people. We need to keep teachers not cater to a few pact parents.

Mike, that may be true, but Castro will still be overcrowded, which has been a big problem for them. Someone has to move. Would people be happier if the district spent the $2M to move someone other than PACT? Seems like people just hate PACT, which I just don't get. They don't take any more day-to-day resources than any other group; they raise their own money for their special programs like Arts Focus, and the reason they are being selected to move is that they are a self-contained unit and it's less disruptive to the school community as a whole. They actually have special legal status under the Ed Code as an "alternative school"-- so they are, in effect a school by themselves, they just don't have their own principal. And no--I do not have nor have I ever had kids in PACT, so I'm not just defending "my" program.

And note to "Mum" -- read the story again, it's LASD and MVLA High School districts pink-slipping right now. MVWSD might need to, but I have not heard that they have pink-slipped any teachers as of yet. There was the possibility of pink-slipping some classified staff (secretaries, clerks, etc.).

There is a school board meeting on March 23rd at 7 p.m. for Mountain View Los Altos High School District.

1299 Bryant Avenue
Mountain View, CA 94040

We need to advocate for our kids and the school programs. I plan on being there and I hope some of you are there as well.

The article stated that MV elementary district administrators said there will be no layoffs of full time teachers. Unfortunately that flatly was not true.

Within the past few weeks, the district terminated a dozen or so teachers who are up for tenure. These were teachers who gave their heart and soul to our kids, schools and the community over the past years. Many of these teachers have been receiving great reviews right up to the time of termination. The district refused to give any reasons and casually destroyed the teaching career of those valuable teachers who will never be able to teach in Mountain View district again.

In today’s economic turmoil, we do understand the budgetary difficulties and that the district may not be able to retain all its teachers without assistance. However, the way the elementary school district used and discarded these teachers was simply WRONG. These are the same educators who we have entrusted to teach our children the difference between right and wrong?!

Maybe the district should be laying off the administrators and save the teachers.

Why when there is a budgetary crises does the state pick on the teachers all the time, while the state legislature are the ones who don't know how to budget the money in the first place?

Along with them and the governor they are the ones who created the mess. Why aren't their jobs cut? Why aren't they made to sacrifice like the rest of us? People put up with the crap going on in Sacramento all the time and don't get angry enough. They all should be made to step down.

I have just read the article "Parents up in arms over 'abusive' teacher". The Stephanie Totter in the article is the same administrator who have just destroyed the teaching career of a dozen or so valuable teachers in the MV elementary district. She obviously has a different perspective on the kind of teacher who is a "good match" for MV district. It certainly is not the well being of our children.