Lawrence school board member Mary Loveland last week said she was beginning to get comfortable with reducing school nursing positions as the district seeks to cut $5 million before next school year.

But then she met with Pinckney School teachers Tuesday.

“That school nurse is the clinic for that school,” Loveland said.

The option is only a small piece of getting board members to their budget goal, but Loveland said the choice illustrates how difficult a job board members have in the midst of the state’s financial crisis.

They have discussed cuts as severe as cutting teaching jobs and closing elementary schools.

At their Monday meeting, board members won’t make any decisions, but they will shed some light on which direction they are leaning on options for cuts.

“It depends on which 24-hour period you ask me,” Loveland said of the board’s choices.

Options

Board members have received a list of school program cuts, including a $250,000 cut to district administration and jobs like school nurses, guidance counselors and librarians. They could pick and choose from that list, which totals $3 million.

The other major scenarios mentioned for savings include raising the student-teacher ratio, which saves roughly $1 million at each increase of one student. That would cut about 20 teaching positions at each increase, as well. This move would mean larger elementary class sizes and fewer courses at secondary schools.

Administrators have said closing an elementary school would save between $400,000 to $600,000 each. A group of parents opposed to this option has formed an organization, Save Our Neighborhood Schools.

But other parents have voiced concerns about class sizes getting too large.

Robert Beeley, a Langston Hughes School parent, doesn’t want to see any schools closed, but he also says larger classes will hurt schools across the district.

“I would like to find a way to keep the student-teacher ratio down,” Beeley said.

According to projections, if the school board raised the ratio by two students next year, the district would have 25 kindergarten through third-grade classes with 26 or more students and 10 fourth- through sixth-grade classes with 31 or more students. Without changing the ratio, the district would have no classes with that many students.

The larger classes come when schools have to reduce, for instance, from having four sixth-grade classes to three classes at Langston Hughes or from three second-grade classes at Cordley School to two.

“It will vary from school to school, and it will vary widely from grade to grade even within a school,” said Frank Harwood, the district’s chief operations officer.

Harwood said administrators have also looked at shifting boundaries as a way to fill up schools that have more room.

Chuck Epp, a member of Save Our Neighborhood Schools, said if the district closed an elementary school it would create larger class sizes anyway because the district would need to move a large number of students.

Members of Save Our Neighborhood Schools say the district can save $5.5 million without closing schools or raising the student-teacher ratio. Their proposal includes saving $1 million by having the district stop transferring money from its general operating budget into a student materials fund, where the district saves up money for major textbook purchases.

“We’re in a crisis right now, and we believe that a transfer like that and possibly delaying textbook purchases for one year could save multiple schools,” said Alee Phillips, who teaches accounting at Kansas University.

Weighing in

As board members prepare to present their stances Monday, Loveland says she would like to keep class sizes as low as possible and to protect teaching jobs.

“There are some jobs we have to cut, and maybe they may have to filled by volunteers,” she said.

The board’s meeting will be at 7 p.m. Monday at district headquarters, 110 McDonald Drive. Board members are expected to discuss their budget options first before taking public comment. After the discussion, members of the public can to respond to what board members said.

The meeting could provide clarity about which options are getting a serious look.

Or it could produce more questions.

“They might want more details,” Harwood said. “We’ll have to see what direction they go.”