Opinions Regarding Fresh Round of Rockwood Proposed Budget Cuts Can Be Voiced Before Tuesday's Meeting

Amidst waves of budget considerations and constraints, Rockwood School District administrators recently offered a new round of ways to shave more dollars from the district's future budget shortfall. The current effort is designed to create a sustainable budget for 2013 and beyond.

Rockwood officials will host what they entitled an input and budget option discussion this Tuesday from 4 p.m. to 9:15 p.m. at Crestview Middle School, which is located at 16025 Clayton Road in Ellisville. Rockwood parents, employees and taxpayers can attend all or portions of the evening's meeting.

Twenty items on a target list of options reflect a total savings of $14.15 million. According to the district's website, the list is offered in order of priority. If that's the case, the first five steps recommended include:

1. Reducing technology allocation budgets for $100,000 at all three levels of primary and secondary education;
2. Replacing five part-time computer support specialists with two full-time technical support specialists for elementary and middle schools for a savings of $35,000;
3. Cutting in half the amount of time that Family and Consumer Science (FACS) teachers at the four high schools have for preparing and concluding each school year beyond actual attendance days from 10 to five contracted days, which will cost $40,000 less than currently executed; 
4. Standardizing the amount of days that middle and high school counselors receive as extended contract days beyond the regular school year for recordkeeping, which will save $45,000;
5. Reducing the number of high school assistant principals by four to save $400,000.

Higher price-tag projects on the list of 20 items—such as reducing bus transportation and eliminating the strings program across all elementary schools—seem to hit Rockwood families in more obvious, immediate or emotional ways.

Eliminating the elementary strings program is expected to save $570,000, but Rockwood orchestra teachers said they are concerned about why an assessment effort was not first followed, similar to what has been done for other districtwide programs under budget scrutiny.

Increasing the distance for bus services received to outside of 2.5 miles around each school building is projected to save $1.5 million. Another $1.5 million is saved if that distance is further increased to 3.5 miles around schools.

The largest item on the list, which was set at a savings of $3.23 million, was to freeze the salaries of all regular full- and part-time professional teachers who are paid on the basis of the teacher salary schedule, excluding supervisory and administrative employees.

Moving from the current hybrid-block schedule to a traditional seven-period day at the high schools also is expected to save $2.76 million.

The draft of the newly proposed budget options was created by Rockwood's Design Team, which consists of administrators who directly report to Superintendent Bruce Borchers and serve as organizational leaders in six areas: Communications, Kim Cranston; Curriculum and School Leadership, Carrie Luttrell; Facilities, Dennis Griffith; Finances, Shirley Broz; Human Resources, Kevin McMillan; and Technology, Steve Beatty.

Rockwood's Chief Communications Officer Kim Cranston said the list was based on more than 9,400 stakeholder written comments, as well as input provided at several meetings. 

Cranston said her staff compiled all the comments, and that the Design Team managers read through them all.  "We grouped them by topic or category, and spent several days reviewing, evaluating and researching the suggestions," she said.

All interested individuals can provide their feedback on the proposed options by going to the district's website and completing the online anonymous feedback form. Cranston confirmed people do not have to attend Tuesday night's meeting for their responses to be considered by the district's decision-makers.

Individuals may e-mail or phone Design Team members at any time, however they will be available for budget option discussions from 4 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Tuesday evening at Crestview Middle to answer questions from community residents. They also be available after the formal presentation tomorrow, from 8:30 p.m. to 9:15 p.m.

One particular response on Rockwood's website from a poster who indicated they were the parent of a student seemed to sum up many of the concerns parents have been voicing at school-related and athletic gatherings for the past week. Comments from that poster follow verbatim.

Eureka-Wildwood Patch started reporting last year on the initiated by Rockwood district representatives. Coverage about updates and results will continue.