Shawnee Mission District to cut jobs!
EDITOR’S COMMENTARY
TO SCALE BACK ON EXPENSES, SCHOOL DISTRICT TO CUT 144 JOBS FOR 2009-2010 by Wayne Hodges
OVERLAND PARK, KS – The sad state of our nation’s faltering economy, in addition to massive shortfalls in state budgets, has now affected the Shawnee Mission School District. And, unfortunately, more jobs will be lost as a result. Recently, school board officials announced plans to trim the budget by a walloping $10 million for the 2009-2010 school year. Why? The state of Kansas, in an effort to slice the budget, will be allocating less money for public schools.
The cuts will eliminate approximately 144 full-time jobs; which would include teachers, counselors, paraprofessionals, campus police officers, and school administrators. To seek immediate answers, an estimated 200 parents and faculty members attended a recent school board meeting, held by Superintendent Gene Johnson, only to be told the cuts are inevitable. Although it could take months before the budget recommendations are finalized, school board officials are expecting the worse.
Johnson, as painful as it was, explained every budget cut step-by-step. But, it didn’t stop parents and staff members from voicing their concerns. “This is my purpose in life,” said Trudy Vande Kamp, a middle school counselor who found out her job could be in jeopardy. “I’m a listener, a supporter and have actually been credited with saving young students’ lives.”
Oh, the bad news isn’t over. Even with the proposed $10 million in cuts, the district will still suffer an $8.5 million budget deficit for 2009-2010, and a $9.6 million deficit the following school year in 2010-2011. I guess it’s not an understatement to say “only the strong will survive.” Let’s just hope as a society we can weather this wild economic storm. President Barack Obama, needless to say, certainly has his work cut out for him.
Wayne Hodges, an MBA from St. Mary University, is the editor of “Mass Appeal News.” He is also an adjunct professor, MPA at Kansas University, and legislative intern with the Kansas Senate. Wayne welcomes your comments at whodges@massappealnews.com
To see protests against educational budget cuts, click the play arrow on the video box.
May 4th, 2009 at 6:56 am
I understand the state legislature has its hands full, but why cut the education budget? As a nation, we are behind the rest of the world when it comes to science and math. From where I’m standing we need more teachers and administrators, not less.
May 4th, 2009 at 7:00 am
Everybody is laying off today. So, what else is new? Wouldn’t surprise me if we ended up in a Depression.
May 8th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I don’t get it. If they keep cuttin jobs what are people to do? Starve, or perhaps they won’t be satisfied until the crime rate rises beyond control. It seems like every single day companies are cutting jobs. Yet, I keep hearing from government officials that things will eventually turn around. Am I missing something?
May 13th, 2009 at 7:53 am
GREED is not only reared it’s ugly head, it has eaten the ole boys of USA! The fat cats
have swindled the poor for so long, and now that the well is running dry and they have
to dip in their own pockets, they are now crying and calling for help.
Our education system here in the metro, and in this country has been broke for years. That’s why so many people in the last 20 yrs have gone to home schooling their kids, they now even have home school associations where kids play sports, have proms, etc. But these are people who decided long ago they had enough of the madness and wanted out the rat race.
Our schools all over the world have been nothing more than a legal money laundering scheme. All the Casinos, Sports Teams and Venues, Race Tracks, all the things that were supposed to pump MILLIONS of dollars into the schools, but where’s the money? Somebodies pockets are fat, but they pass it off as research projects and things of that nature.
Now that it’s reached the well to do, there is a problem. But when USD500 was crying foul, and saying the monies are not being divided up evenly in the state, they laughed and said so (basically) but now that Shawnee, and Olathe, and all these other places are having problems, now it’s such a dirty shame. It’s been a shame for years!
May 13th, 2009 at 8:56 am
JD, I agree with you 100%. And I also believe, as a society, we’re headed towards home schooling for our children. The software is in place. And the general lack of state revenue, teachers, etc., will no doubt expedite this process.
May 19th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Instead of paying coaches and athletes millions of dollars, the government should pump more money into education. How much sense does it make to pay entertainers multi millions but not pay the teachers of our nation?
May 28th, 2009 at 7:21 am
“For the love of money is the root to all evil.”
February 22nd, 2010 at 11:09 am
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