District 57 Schools Chief Proposes More Staff Cuts

By Steve Zalusky Daily Herald Staff Writer

Mount Prospect School District 57 plans to open the 2006-07 school year with a leaner staff.

Superintendent Bruce Brown at Thursday’s board of education meeting, held at Lincoln Junior High School, proposed a series of additions and subtractions to staff that would result in a net reduction of more than four positions.

Most of the nearly nine full-time positions targeted Thursday for elimination are instruction assistants. The only change in teaching staff is the elimination of 1.5 positions, including an assistant to the principal.

Additions include the hiring of a new principal for the soon-to- be reopened Westbrook school.

Two weeks ago, Brown presented the board with a series of personnel cuts. The board, however, called for an additional 3 percent in cuts.

Brown responded Thursday by proposing cutting such positions as the district’s learning resource assistants, the assistant transportation director, and a part-time custodian, as well as reconfiguring food service staff at Lincoln Junior High School and reducing public information from full-time to part-time.

“We’re always going to be looking at budget-deficit reduction, because we’re always going to be in the red,” Brown said. “It’s just the result of tax caps and the way Illinois funds schools. There is nothing that we can do about it as a board. There is nothing that most districts can do about this.”

Board of education members are expected to approve the plan at their March 16 meeting.

Brown said the board should expect service to be affected by the cuts.

“We are going to see our program service delivery change,” he said, “whether it’s going to be that our LRC hours change or that it will be an all-parent network that helps our learning center directors, rather than assistants.”

Board members supported Brown’s proposal. However, board member Brian McPartlin said he would like to have seen additional teaching staff at Lions Park Elementary School.

McPartlin said there was a reduction last year in what is now the fourth-grade section.

“They were the largest class and they went from five sections in third grade to four sections in fourth grade. Their class size increased by six per classroom.