Jobs of 62 On Line In Milford Schools Levy

Cincinnati Enquirer (Cincinnati, OH): The jobs of 11 teachers, 30 instructional aides, 21 kindergarten aides and 6 K-6 school counselors could be eliminated if the Milford School District loses its 7.9-mill levy vote in May. Superintendent John Frye outlined $4.2 million in proposed budget cuts for the 2006-07 school year at Thursday's school board meeting. The district's total budget is $52.8 million. More than 60 percent of the cuts would come from personnel. The district doesn't plan to lay off teachers, but would not fill 11 positions vacated by retirements and resignations. The district already made $2.2 million in cuts this year. "We did an awful lot of the non-personnel items to preserve the classroom as we know it," Frye said of this year's cuts. "If the levy fails, we're really going to get into what has made us successful in Milford, and that is our instructional support staff." [Personal comment: GET THIS! They plan to reassign the counselors "...to teaching positions that became vacant because of resignations or retirements..." because, of course, the job of a counselor = the job of a teacher and besides...the kids don't really need the counselors! I'm kidding, of course. We counselors always find ourselves on the chopping block, not matter what state at which you look. Yet, when a crisis occurs they wonder what to do and what could have been done? Well....for starters, stop cutting counselors and allows us to do what we're meant to do: prevention education in the classroom.]