NORTHFIELD — Due to a 25 percent drop in enrollment at Pioneer Valley Regional School over the past eight years, administrators are proposing a roughly 13 percent reduction in staff for next school year.
According to Pioneer Principal Jean Bacon, 10 full-time positions are being cut, as well as one administrator, and one districtwide technical support staff member will be reduced to half-time.
Currently, Bacon said, there are 88 staff members at Pioneer. While it is currently unclear which positions will be affected, Bacon said the administration will consider what individual teachers offer, as well as how the layoffs would affect class size and diversity of programs.
“It’s never easy to lose some staff,” Superintendent Ruth Miller said during a Pioneer Valley Regional School District budget subcommittee meeting. “It’s really the only way we’re going to right-size this budget at all.”
Between a nearly $55,000 reduction to the assistant principal’s salary, and the reduction in staffing, the cutbacks would save the district more than $360,000.
One of the goals, Bacon said, was to lower Pioneer’s overall budget by 9 or 10 percent. Figures accurate as of Thursday show the overall budget dropped nearly $300,000 from fiscal year 2017, a reduction of about 7 percent.
Miller said that at the elementary level, staffing levels have decreased gradually over the years. As staff retired, their positions were eliminated and classes were consolidated accordingly. However, Miller said no such adjustments have been made at Pioneer, until now.
Bacon said that in just the past five years, Pioneer’s enrollment has declined by 140 students. As of the start of the 2016-2017 school year, Pioneer had 409 students.
“There’s a big misalignment,” Bacon said. “We just don’t need as many teachers to deliver education to a population that’s 140 less.”
Bacon said School Council has endorsed the proposal.
Although 11 full-time positions and one half-time position are being cut, the reduction in staff will not be quite so dramatic. Two of the affected staff members have plans to retire, and Bacon intends to add four new full-time positions and one half-time position, ones that she believes better fit the needs of the school.
“It’s shifting the positions to support the goals of the school,” Miller explained.
The new positions include: an online learning facilitator, who will supervise students in a lab environment while they work on online classwork; a districtwide science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics (STEAM) facilitator; a college and career readiness facilitator; a Tier II interventionist to give small group or individualized instruction to students who require extra support; and a half-time instructional assistant supervisor to oversee instructional assistants and ensure they receive necessary training.
Miller said the dean of students’ position will be eliminated, leaving only Bacon and Assistant Principal Jennifer Albert Perry as administrators.
Regardless, Bacon said she doesn’t feel the changes will be detrimental to the students’ education.
“I think we can reduce this many teaching staff and still offer the diverse programming we’ve been offering. That’s what makes Pioneer special,” she said. “I don’t think less resources mean a drop in quality.”
Bacon added the changes would mean condensing classes, but said it would even out class numbers. Some classes currently have as few as six students.
“My goal is to have class sizes between 17 and 22,” she said. “Talking to the other principals in the region, it seems fairly typical.”
The school district’s fiscal year 2018 budget will be voted on by the school committee during a Feb. 9 meeting, following a Feb. 7 public hearing. The public hearing will be held at 7 p.m. in the Pioneer auditorium.