The Board of Education of the Temecula Valley Unified School District is making very difficult decisions in order to balance our budget for the 2010-2011 school year. Despite the deeply appreciated agreements from our employee associations and management for furlough days and the deeply regretted but necessary employee lay-offs, a gap of approximately six milllion dollars still exists.

As the board continues to deliberate, staff brings many items of information to them in order assist in their decision making.

Once again, the closing of a school continues to be an option to further reduce the deficit. We did close Sparkman Elementary in 2009. This was a difficult decision and not made lightly. Faced with even deeper cuts this year, the board and staff agreed all possible options must be considered.

At the meeting of March 16, staff presented to the board many options to further close the budget gap. Some of these options include reducing Home to School Transportation, realignment of Athletic funding and another elementary school closure.

The following schools were identified due to their enrollments: Paloma, Pauba Valley, Red Hawk and Rancho.

Staff provided information regarding the impact of a possible school closure to the identified schools and surrounding school communities. This data resulted in a recommendation to the board that NO additional elementary schools be closed. The board agreed they are not interested in closing another school at this time.

In the future, if additional state budget cuts reduce our funding yet again, a school closure may be revisited. Should that be the case, we will notify affected sites prior to Board discussion.
Please be assured the TVUSD School Board is carefully gathering information and making difficult but necessary decisions to keep our district fiscally solvent. The budget information shared last night was for information only and no action was taken.

Sincerely,

Carol A. Leighty, Ed.D.
Superintendent

Dear TVUSD Parents and Guardians,

In recent weeks, the Temecula Valley Unified School District Governing Board has made a number of decisions that will greatly impact our students and our schools. Most of these are a result of the $20-$26 million budget shortfall our district faces. With 2010/11 budget preparations underway, our Governing Board has begun the process of approving reduction measures that will keep our district fiscally solvent.

One significant action, recently approved, is the implementation of Work Year Reduction Days. Since nearly 87% of our expenditures are for salaries and benefits, reducing the work year is one of the few options we have to balance our budget. In efforts to reduce operating costs, our entire school district will close down for nine days between now and the end of the 2010/11 school year. That is, two days this year and seven days next year.

Please note, the Work Year Reduction Days this year are Friday, March 12th and Friday, May 28th. All of our schools, offices and facilities will be closed on these days and students will not attend school. The two Work Year Reduction Days this year as well as the seven days next year are reflected on updated Student/Teacher Calendars posted on the TVUSD web site, www.tvusd.k12.ca.us.

Our employees have agreed to reducing their work years, some by as many as twelve days, saving our district millions of dollars. This collaborative effort, made possible by our employee associations, management team and Governing Board, will allow us to avoid making the type of drastic cuts we all strive to avoid.

In 2010/11, the school year for our students will be reduced from 180 days to 175 days. The work year for our teachers will be reduced from 185 days to 178 days. While the loss of school days is troubling, when faced with making over $20 million in budget reductions our options are few and far between. Reducing employee work years’ will not resolve our budget problems entirely, but it proves to be the best solution to address an extremely difficult situation.

Another action, recently approved, is an adjustment to our school year calendar. In the upcoming 2010/11 school year, you will see a change to our start and end date. The first day of school has been moved up by three days to Wednesday, August 11th. The last day falls on Friday, May 27th, due in part to the reduced school year.

The decision to adjust the school calendar was approved by our Governing Board last year after discussions with teachers regarding semesters at the high school level. By moving the start date up, the first semester will conclude prior to winter break. Currently, students leave for a two-week break, return for a week and then take final exams. Research supports a more cohesive instructional program by taking finals prior to the winter break. The best way to achieve this is to adjust the start of the school year.

Our Governing Board has also approved an agreement to increase class sizes in grades K-12 for the upcoming school year. This is yet another budget reduction measure. The chart below shows our current class sizes and class sizes next year.

Class Sizes: Current Year vs. Upcoming Year

Grade2009/102010/11
Kindergarten2122
1st Grade2123
2nd Grade2125
3rd Grade2126
4th – 5th Grade3233
6th Grade3436
7th – 8th Grade3638
9th grade Algebra and English 2436-38

As a result of this adjustment, our board approved preliminary layoff notices for approximately 160 certificated (teaching) staff. It is our hope that the number of preliminary notices distributed in March will be greatly reduced by the time final layoff notices go out in May.

Additional layoffs will occur in our management and classified ranks.The board is also considering other programmatic reductions to assist in balancing our budget. What is most unfortunate is that all of these budget reductions would not be necessary if not for continued cuts in funding by the state of California.

Please know that we are far from done exploring our options to save jobs. We continue to look for creative ways to retain as many of our teachers and staff as possible. Our Governing Board and I are very proud and grateful for the spirit of collaboration, trust and sacrifice our employees have shown. Often, it is in the face of adversity that we recognize our strength as individuals, as parents and as a community. Much like our employees have banded together, I believe our school community can come together to make it through this difficult year ahead.
I hope you will find inspiration in the incredible achievements our students continue to make each day. Year after year, we see our future generations making tremendous strides in academics, athletics, the arts, and in community involvement. I truly believe we are succeeding in providing options and opportunities for all of our students to achieve.

As a district, we will continue to move forward, realizing that while we may have a steep hill to climb, we will get through it by working together and retaining a sense of optimism for the future.

Sincerely,

Carol A. Leighty, Ed.D.
Superintendent
Temecula Valley Unified School District

• Observe Ash Wednesday. I attend Mass on Ash Wednesday, and receive the ash cross on my forehead after Mass. I do not eat any meat, and have only a main meal and two smaller meals with no snacking in between. I also do this on Good Friday.
• Know what Lent is: According to the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, “Lent is a 40-day liturgical season that begins on Ash Wednesday and concludes at the Great Vigil of Easter. Sundays are not included in the 40-day count because every Sunday is a joyful celebration of Jesus’ resurrection. Though not biblical, Lent has long been a tradition in the Christian Church, and it is thought that the tradition of the 40 days recalls the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness, fasting and being tempted by Satan (Matthew 4:1-11). Lent is considered a time of penance and discipline.” This is a pretty general description but with a quick Google Search you can find out so much more.
• I decorate my home in some purple decor; this reminds me of the suffering and death, but also royalty and hope of the resurrection.
• I Spend Lent with additional prayer, reflection and repentance. Lent is a time for soul-searching, facing great challenges and overcoming mistakes. This may be the perfect time to get back in touch with your spiritual life if you have strayed. We all fall off the wagon start with some forgiveness for you.
• I follow the tradition of Lent by fasting, done in honor of Christ’s own 40-day fast in the desert. I do this by giving up meat on Fridays and just being more aware of my intake. You can do this in whatever way seems appropriate to you – its intensity varies from total abstinence to refraining from eating meat. Many churches focus less on fasting and encourage charitable deeds.
• Give up something you love for the 40-day period or add a daily deed of faith, symbolizing the Lenten season’s return to simplicity and purity. I have given up gum as a child and as an adult I have given up Diet Coke and drive time radio and music – as long as the meaning of its absence or addition holds significant value to you.
• I make room for Easter and the new life of spring. While this season might be tinged with solemnity, it should also be a time of looking forward to renewal and triumph. I like to start this season with gardening getting back in touch with the rebirth of Spring.
• Meat Fast on Fridays: The fast food restaurants start with Fish Sandwich specials and Catholic Churches everywhere will be having their Fish Fries. If I make an oops and have meat by accident on a Friday, I start over again on Saturday.
• Understand Good Friday: According to churchyear.net, “Good Friday is the Friday within Holy Week, and is traditionally a time of fasting and penance, commemorating the anniversary of Christ’s crucifixion and death. For Christians, Good Friday commemorates not just a historical event, but the sacrificial death of Christ, which with the resurrection, comprises the heart of the Christian faith. The Catholic Catechism states this succinctly: Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ who offered himself on the cross as a living victim, holy and pleasing to God, and whose blood has become the instrument of atonement for the sins of all men (CCC 1992).
• Prepare for Easter: I love hiding eggs for the kids, pretty Easter dresses, and planning Easter Dinner, but don’t forget the reason for the season. Easter is the amazing season of forgiveness. Remember if Jesus did all that He did so you can be forgiven; bring forgiveness into your life for yourself and others.

Then they started pouring in, one caught my eye that pointed to an LA Times article. I clicked on the article and sure enough Nick Jonas has been doing surprise concerts. I gathered up the girls and we headed to Main Street to see if they had set up a stage. Hmmmmm, no stage.

Could still be a rumor?

The next round of Tweets mentioned Disney 365 on the Disney Walk. We decided we would walk over to the girly store Disney 365, if we saw nothing we would leave… if we saw any signs something was up we would stay.

Sure enough a stage was set up!

There were about 100 girls lined up along the gate that was set up around the store. The girls found a front spot and we waited. The crowd grew and everyone was following Twitter to check out the news. Then @nickjonas released that the concert would begin at 7:30pm. Wow, the girls were going to get to see Nick Jonas up close. SCORE! At 7:35 he emerged from Disney 365 and sang 4 songs. The girls stayed up front and had a perfect view. Then after song four, he thanked the crowd and started walking over to the fence. He was shaking hands and the girls got to see him up close and personal and shake his hand WOW!!!!!! This was one of those moments the girls will talk about until they are old women. They will tell the tale of Twitter (Will anyone remember Twitter by then?) and the night they “TOUCHED” their Tween Crush.

It was a good mom night. They thanked me a billion times for finding out about the concert and letting them go. They thanked me for standing there for two hours. They just said Thank You a lot, but I will let you in on a secret…. I thank them for letting me relive that excitement of a youthful crush, for letting me see the look of pure joy as they sang along to his four new songs, and just for being there to be part of who they are. Someday when they are Moms they will know that I had an even better time than they did just by being there, to see them be there.