Less Funding, Fewer Opportunities: the Reality of School Budget Cuts

TEACH. Ms. Sylvain teaches a crowded 1st period class. Teachers' classes are expected to have more students in them to help adapt to the schools budget cuts. Photo courtesy of Jacob Henley.

With fewer people enrolling in Vashon Island School District, legislative changes, and overall changes to administrative positions and classes, VISD will experience budget cuts for years to come. These budget cuts are going to affect everyone in different ways. For example, administrators will have increased work loads due to these budget cuts; consequently, teachers will feel the effect of a busier administration team, limited offerings of what classes they can teach, and classes that are completely full.

Sabrina Kovacs, the vice-prinicipal, had a few things to share about the budget cuts.

“The system as a whole bears the weight of budget cuts, so I think it is felt by everyone. I believe next year’s budget cuts will affect administration the most due to increased workloads. This is felt by everyone: teachers, other staff, students, and families,” Kovacs shared.

Although Ms. Kovacs is leaving next year, she still wants the system to be as prepared as possible. This is vital to the success of the administration and everyone else.

“Building strong systems and holding people accountable to those systems is critical to preventing acute, negative effects. We need to communicate clearly about expectations, and develop ways to progress and monitor all the important teaching and learning happening every day,” Kovacs shared.

While the school can't completely minimize the effects of these budget cuts, they will do their best to make the difference as minimal as possible. Teachers will be most likely be affected personally.

“I have worked at Vashon School District for four years, and each year there have been either actual or proposed budget cuts,” freshman biology teacher Christophor Stone shared.

These cuts create a challenging work environment because the staff care deeply about the work they do. Stone highlights how scary and problematic these budget cuts are for the school district and everyone involved.

Although administration, teachers, and students are experiencing different problems and challenges, staff will come together to make sure learning for students will continue to the fullest extent possible. Hopefully the biggest change students will feel are fuller classes and a smaller selection of electives offered.

Blake Bennett, a sophomore at VHS, thought there might be a few changes based on budget cuts next year.

“I feel like there could be more distractions going on if classes were fuller, and I might not get the help I need to excel,” Bennett said.

These fuller classrooms will likely affect students' grades because they won't get help as often as they do now, and the farther they fall behind, the more help they may need.

“I feel like it's already hard to choose between electives, and as you go up in years, you start to run out of the really fun electives. With less electives, it would just put you in a harder spot mentally,” Bennett said.

Students will likely feel far more stressed due to a multitude of factors: less help in classes, more distractions, boring electives that would also be full, and much more.

These budget cuts will result in less opportunities of electives for students, fuller classes resulting in more stressed students and teachers alike, and more stressed administrators due to increased workloads.

LEARN. The high school's budget cuts have been stated to be around $1 Million. This will impact everyone in the school district. Photo courtesy of Jacob Henley.