NASHUA – Hockey, skiing and several teaching positions have been saved for now, but families will be expected to pay fees for sports and extracurricular activities next year to help make up the difference.
At a Saturday morning budget meeting, Board of Education members made several moves, including voting to restore high school hockey and skiing to the budget.
The proposed elimination of hockey drew strong opposition at a public hearing earlier this month.
“Certainly the sentiment of many students and taxpayers indicate broad support for these programs,” said board member David Murotake.
Board President Robert Hallowell made the motion to bring back the sports and it was unanimously approved. Hockey and skiing would have been eliminated in Superintendent Mark Conrad’s budget proposal.
But while those sports were saved, board members also moved forward with implementing a pay-to-play system. The board voted to raise $200,000 next year, charging fees for sports, as well as for activities that require a paid advisor.
Board member Tom Vaughan, who made the motion, said the administration’s proposal for a fee schedule should be used as a baseline, but there were no decisions made at the meeting about how much students would be charged.
Board member Rick Dowd cast the only vote against the proposal.
Under the administration’s proposal, hockey players would be charged $500, with most other sports requiring a fee of $150. Tennis, track and cheerleading would be $50.
In addition to the per-sport fee, all students who wanted to play sports or take part in extracurricular activities would be charged $25, under the proposal.
Students eligible for free or reduced lunch would be exempt. Students would be asked to pay the $25 activity fee, but would not be required.
The school district has never charged for sports, but does have a policy allowing for it. In 2005, the Board of Education did implement pay-to-play, but an anonymous donation of $200,000 ensured students wouldn’t have to pay.
Moving into the next budget meeting on Tuesday night, the board’s changes to the budget have resulted in an increase of $121,943 from Conrad’s original proposal of $93.3 million.
The board could still add to or cut from the budget before sending it to City Hall by the end of this week.
Conrad’s proposal went above the spending cap by $2 million. Mayor Donnalee Lozeau told board members last week she would be likely to support that and urged board members to keep spending to that level.
Also at Saturday’s meeting, the board restored four of the 11 currently-filled middle school teaching positions that had been proposed for elimination. That means seven filled positions and two vacant ones would still be cut.
Vaughan was the only member to vote against restoring the teachers.
That is in addition to the seven elementary school teachers the board restored last week.
At the beginning of the meeting, Susan Giudici, a science teacher at Fairgrounds Middle School, urged the board to restore the middle school positions. Giudici said the fewer teachers there are, the more difficult it is to personalize education and communicate with parents.
She also said it takes away from the time teachers have to collaborate with the other members of their team.
“We plan for interdisciplinary lessons, we talk about which students maybe we need to call parents,” she said. “There is a lot of nitty gritty planning.”
Realizing the board wanted to add teachers back in, Conrad came to the meeting with suggested cuts to other administrative and non-classroom staff.
The board approved the cuts, totaling $246,015, which included eliminating the executive director of student services. Also cut were a custodian at each high school, an administrative position yet to be specified and $23,771 in school supplies.
Those are in addition to the two high school custodians already being cut and administrative reductions already in the budget, including eliminating two assistant principals.
Conrad cautioned board members against cutting too deep into administrators. For example, administrators played a significant role in putting together initiatives to help decrease the dropout rate, he said.
“That was almost a purely administrative process,” Conrad said.
Although she has stressed her support for the classroom, Sandra Ziehm voted against Conrad’s proposed reductions because it included adding $6,000 to the English Language Learner director Robert Cioppa’s salary.
Conrad said the raise would make up for the extra workload that would be asked of Cioppa due to eliminating the student services position, but Ziehm said people shouldn’t be expected to get paid more just because they are asked to do more.
“I have asked people to work for me to take on heavier work loads and I’ve said to them, ‘If you’re lucky, you won’t lose your job,’ ” said Ziehm, who is owner of Harmony Real Estate in Hudson.
Vaughan also voted against Conrad’s proposed cuts.
Additionally, the board voted to restore the off-site suspension center for middle school students, which, had it been cut, would have saved $45,125. The center is operated by the Nashua Youth Council.
Board member Jack Kelley said the program has been helping students stay in school and should be retained.
“Taking this away from them is just giving them an added incentive to drop out,” Kelley said.
Board members Hallowell, Vaughan, Dennis Ryder and William Mosher voted against restoring the center.
As it stands, the budget still calls for eliminating 15 currently-filled teaching positions at the high schools, which will force the school district to limit credit allowance for underclassmen to seven credits instead of eight.
Concerns have been raised about whether that would give freshmen and sophomores the opportunity to take music courses, but Conrad has said he doesn’t think it is going to be an issue.
Another aspect of the high school proposal that has drawn criticism is the requirement for freshmen and sophomores to have 45-minute study halls with 150 to 200 students in the cafeteria. The study halls would be manned by four monitors.
Conrad has said he doesn’t support the concept, but said it would be necessary because scheduling is already tight at the high schools. Class sizes can only go so high before teachers have to be paid a stipend for extra students, he said.
Board members, parents and students have questioned whether there would be safety issues with that many students being together at one time.
