Efficiency proposals eschewed

Charlottesville’s school division is bypassing several of the more controversial recommendations in a recent efficiency review, including calls for increasing class sizes, firing six assistant principals and cutting dozens of instructional assistants.

“It seems to me that’s still a discussion we need to have with the public,” School Board Chairman Ned Michie said. He added, referring to current staffing levels and smaller classes, “I like all those things, and I think the community likes all those things, but it is a huge cost driver.”

Division administration presented a draft document to the School Board on Thursday outlining which recommendations have been accepted, modified or rejected, plus ones that are in need of further discussion. Some recommendations’ fates were decided solely by administrators, such as the rejection of restructuring the division’s central office and the acceptance of putting more items out for bid to get better prices.

Other recommendations’ outcomes were based on sentiments previously expressed by the School Board, such as going to a paperless meeting system and eliminating a vacant professional development position, which has been done for the proposed fiscal 2010 budget. Decisions on many other recommendations will be based on input from administrators, board members and the community.

Based on the chart of recommendations presented Thursday, the decisions concerning class size, cutting several instructional assistant positions and firing six assistant principals are being made by the School Board, but with administrative and community input.

“Decisions need to be made in consultation,” said Harley Miles, the division’s supervisor of assessment and technical services.

Because the document is not set in stone and decisions could change, some board members, including Juandiego Wade and Leah Puryear, said they thought the document was fine at this point. Plus, division administration said the community and board members have expressed a desire to keep staffing levels steady, which is why the reductions have been rejected. But some School Board members were concerned that some recommendations were seemingly discarded without being vetted by the public.

Board member Kathleen Galvin said the document, which will be posted on the division’s Web site, might send the message that many things have already been decided. While the upcoming budget would increase class sizes because of enrollment declines, the efficiency study said that cutting six assistant principals would save close to $580,000 each year for the next five years, and firing 62 instructional assistants would save $1.32 million annually.

“It’s just something to be treated very carefully,” Galvin said, adding, “It does seem like some things didn’t get public input before they were decided.”

The chart outlined all 62 recommendations that were made in the review, 21 of which have fiscal implications. The most jarring one, which called for the closing of an elementary school, is still in need of more discussion. Superintendent Rosa S. Atkins said that at the upcoming community meetings about the efficiency review, “that’s the main one we will discuss.”

Because of some of the concerns, the board will make a decision at its first meeting in March about whether to further pursue many of the recommendations.

Discussions about school facilities, grade configuration and the relevant recommendations from the study will start as soon as late March. Meetings will be held with a range of groups — including PTO presidents, the Westhaven and South First Street public housing sites and UVa representatives — throughout the spring and terminate in the summer. The School Board likely will make a decision on some of the recommendations at its second meeting in August.

But should things take longer to discuss, “we’re not married to or tied to the August timeline,” Atkins said.