Schools

Board Approves Cutting 22 D161 Teachers; Raises Club, Band and Sports Fees

Because of decreasing enrollment, the Summit Hill school district board reduced its workforce, honorably dismissing teachers. The board also raised fees for clubs, band and sports at Wednesday's meeting to help with the district's bottom line.

CORRECTION: An early version of this story listed the wrong fee amount for clubs. It has been changed to the correct amount, $30.

For the first time in its history, the board of education approved the honorable dismissal of 22 teachers at its Wednesday meeting as part of an overall staff reduction in the district.

The dismissals come as the district's student enrollment is projected to decrease and the board needs to cut more than $3 million from the D161 budget over the next three years. No tenured teachers were let go by the district, Supt. Barb Rains said, adding that a list of eliminated teachers would not be released in accordance with board policy.

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Rains said she would provide Patch with a full list of teachers retained by the district some time Thursday.

Although the teacher cuts were approved unanimously, board member Sean William Doyle voted against the motions for non-renewal and reclassification of staff members. After the meeting, Doyle said because it was a personnel matter and the decision was discussed in closed session, he couldn't identify the staffers involed, but he said he objected to the reasoning behind the decision.

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Rains also would not confirm the identity of the staffers.

Along with cutting teachers, the board also approved fee increases for clubs, sports and band. Club fees were raised to $30 per year, and sports fees were increased to $50 per year, and band was increased to $200 per year for the first child and $100 for the each additional child.

Check back later Thursday and Friday for continuing updates and read the transcript of the meeting's live blog for more details of what happened at Wednesday's board meeting.


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