Schools bracing for double whammy
Financial, academic setbacks could last for years
With schools across California expected to remain closed until the fall, district officials this week started looking toward an ominous future, one filled with fiscal calamity and academic losses from the fallout of the coronavirus crisis.
It could take years for districts to recover, they said.
Without a significant increase in state or federal funding, schools across the state could face emergency layoffs and severe budget cuts next year, said Bill Clark, Contra
Costa County Office of Education deputy superintendent.
Forget summer school or an extended academic year to help kids catch back up.
“The schools would be eager to do that and willing to do that,” Clark said. “It’s just not
going to be fiscally possible.”
Many districts were already stretched financially, preparing to cut budgets to make it through the next fiscal year. Closing schools has only increased current spending on technology, meal distribution, cleaning and other needs.
The state budget — funded by income, sales and corporate taxes — is likely to suffer significantly from revenue losses caused by the shelterinplace orders. Rather than the 2% costofliving increase proposed in the governor’s budget, or about $496 more per student, schools could see no increase, officials said.
Under one recessionary scenario, the state could lose $50 billion in revenue over two years, out of an annual budget of $900 billion.
Many districts could resort to emergency layoffs in August or other ways to cut staff, officials said.
“Many districts throughout the state are talking about an early retirement incentive,” said Lynn Mackey, Contra Costa County superintendent.
More money is going out than expected now because of expenditures related to the closure and less is expected to come in next year — a double whammy, education officials said.
The $100 million provided by the state to help schools with distance learning during the closure is a welcome sign, but ultimately equals $16 per student in the state’s schools, Mackey said.
Still, the immediate focus is on the needs of students and teachers so that teaching and learning can continue in some form through the end of the school year even if classrooms remain closed, she said.
“I think all the educators in our state and our counties have done a miraculous job getting in to place what’s in place so far,” she said.
What happens after the state gets through the next couple of months, however, is still a big question mark for schools.
District officials are waiting on guidance about grading — or what to put on student report cards so that students aren’t penalized academically because of the closure. The state is expected to provide additional guidance in the coming days, although universities and colleges are already easing admission standards to accommodate the absence of letter grades on transcripts.
The closure has wreaked havoc on the system, said state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond.
“We’re not allowing that to punish students beyond their control,” he said.
In a letter to county officials Tuesday, Thurmond acknowledged that schools will be unable to reopen this year, given the safety concerns and ongoing social distancing that comes with the coronavirus response.
District officials said there are many questions, like the status of summer school or rescheduling graduation and prom, that they still can’t answer.
“The only thing official at this time is that summer school registration has been postponed until further notice,” said Brian Kilgore, spokesman for Fremont Unified. “We believe there will be credit recovery available to students in some form and are waiting to receive guidelines from the state.”
Kai Sanchez, 14, would like greater clarity on grading. The Half Moon Bay High School freshman has a 4.0 gradepoint average and is worried about a passfail report card.
“I just think it’s wrong for the students that don’t try and don’t do their homework to get the same grade as me,” she said. “I put time and effort in the things I do.”
Her mom, April Joy Sanchez, worries for the juniors who are applying to college, who don’t know if all colleges will waive the SAT and ACT test requirement like
University of California schools did Wednesday.
The lack of information is confusing and frustrating, especially when everyone is cooped up all day long, Sanchez said.
“There’s nowhere to escape,” the mom said.
For districts and teachers across the state, the unknowns stretch even further. They won’t know for some time what the academic impact will be from the closures. Lowincome students, English learners and students with special needs are likely to be disproportionately affected.
What if students miss critical math concepts needed for the next course in the fall? Will teachers have to backtrack for weeks or months before moving forward, while facing larger class sizes because of layoffs?
Currently, many students still don’t have computers or online access to participate in digital instruction, and it’s unclear how many of the state’s 6.2 million students will never log on or fail to continue learning during the closure.
Money will be scarce to help them get back on track, officials said.
It’s also likely that many students in special education programs will require what is called compensatory services for what they didn’t get during the closure, like occupational therapy or personalized academic instruction. Providing those additional catchup services next year could add significantly to districts’ already strapped budgets.
The financial challenges facing districts are “certainly on our radar,” Thurmond said.
The state is already monitoring where districts have financial challenges and brainstorming ways to support them, he added, including additional funding for school meals provided during the closure.
But Thurmond said his message to families and educators is to focus on the present because “school is not over.”
“Students might not be able to return to campus, but this year is not over,” he said. “I think people are trying to get through the basics of daytoday right now.”
Half Moon Bay High School senior Raven Fortin is trying to make it through each of those days, but she’s also focused on a future that is not what she thought it would be.
“It’s so disappointing,” she said of not being able to wear a cap and gown and walk across a stage as planned. “We’ve been working toward that for four years.”
She doesn’t know if her diploma will just show up in the mailbox or if maybe there will be a ceremony in the summer.
But so far, it feels like she’s being forced to skip a big chapter in her life.
“It’s a huge letdown that we won’t be able to say goodbye to each other,” she said of her classmates. “It seems every day this whole thing gets exponentially more intense.”
That said, the 17yearold, who plans to study public health at Oregon State University in the fall, said she’s living through what will be a different set of memories.
“We’re all living through history,” she said. “We’ll look back on it and go, ‘Yeah, I was there.’ ”