Teacher and building trades program back

by Peter Jakey, Managing Editor

After two months of discussions and tough decisions by members of the Onaway Area Community Schools Board of Education, there is still a lot of work to be done to balance and approve the 2009-10 budget by the end of June. The toughest decisions by the board have been the lay offs of several employees and the moving of the education programs from Millersburg Elementary School to the Onaway school complex.

Along with moving grades K-4 from Millersburg to Onaway, four teachers and two paraprofessionals had been laid off for a savings of $400,000. ?They?ve (the board) been wrestling with where to go next,? said superintendent Bob Szymoniak. ?They laid off two additional teachers, one in the middle school and one in the high school.?

AT TUESDAY?S finance/facilities committee meeting the board approved a motion to bring back math teacher Amber Watson, which allows the reinstating of the building trades programs at the high school. The discontinuation of building trades has been among several layers of issues the board has wrangled with in recent months.

Even with the decisions of this week, the board and administration still have to find additional savings in a deficit projected now at $433,000. At Tuesday?s meeting, the board directed Szymoniak and business manager Rod Fullerton to conduct a line item analysis to chop another $230,000 to $280,000 from the budget.

The board also has agreed to absorb $150,000 to $200,000 from fund equity, but hope it will be less.

In other action from the relatively quick meeting, a resolution from Case Township officials expressi

ng an interest in re-acquiring the Millersburg School building from the district was received. The board wants to explore every opportunity possible to keep the building as an educational facility. Szymoniak is currently exploring options. Should those options not pan out, he will recommend to the board that they accept the offer made by Case Township and turn over ownership of the school property and building.

?The school board passed a motion indicating they received the resolution but were waiting to take action on that resolution, in case something were to develop down that road,? said Szymoniak.

?The school board wants to give it another month or two to see if there is another viable, educational use for that building, that the district can figure out how to fund.? The board will meet in workshop session Tuesday at 6 p.m.