THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, March 9, 1995 TAG: 9503090611
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 12 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: COVER STORY
SOURCE: BY JON GLASS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 187 lines
AT GRANBY HIGH, juniors and seniors citywide would have a chance to earn an international diploma, entree to the world's most prestigious universities.
Across town, at the Madison Career Center, students could attend evening school, designed for kids who can't seem to make it in a regular daytime classroom.
In senior high parking lots, surveillance cameras would scan for signs of trouble, while video systems would be trained on middle and high school hallways and cafeterias. Two-way radios would link teachers and administrators in elementary schools.
And an effort would be launched to improve the public image of the city's schools.
If anyone was looking for a road map where Schools Superintendent Roy D. Nichols Jr. wants to steer the city's schools, the initiatives outlined above would provide it. They reflect four goals: academic opportunity for gifted students, a safety net for underachievers, school discipline and increased community involvement.
Those elements form the framework of Nichols' proposed 1995-96 operating budget for the city's schools. The $187.1 million plan is the product of tough choices and tradeoffs, officials say, in a tight fiscal year that School Board Chairman Ulysses Turner describes as a ``crisis.''
But the bottom line, Nichols says, is that his administration, largely through cutbacks and cost-saving measures, has produced a livable budget. It gives teachers a 3 percent raise, provides some promising new programs and does not require a tax increase.
Nichols says he's proud of it.
``We tried to be frugal,'' Nichols said. ``When we started a new program, we found cuts to do it. I think we were able to make a lot of improvements to the school system and do it without asking for a tax increase.''
Typically, about 40 percent of the school budget is funded by city taxpayers. State funds provide for more than half. Federal dollars make up the rest.
City officials, who have pledged the same level of funding as last year, seem satisfied with the proposal.
``It looks like they've done a good job,'' Mayor Paul D. Fraim said. ``It's my hope to fund them at the level they're requesting.'' The state General Assembly has provided one of the few budget bonanzas. Despite a veto threat from Gov. George F. Allen, the legislature protected millions of dollars the governor wanted to cut, including funds to keep kids from dropping out, a concern in a system that last year had the state's highest dropout rate at 7.9 percent.
Legislators also found money to fund new initiatives involving technology and early childhood care. For Norfolk schools, that translates into $1.1 million for disadvantaged 4-year-olds and $1.5 million to outfit schools with computer technology.
To get the money, the school system will have to match it with about $710,000, but that's a ``pretty good buy,'' Nichols said.
The money will help fund a new early childhood center, the school system's third, to enhance the chances of later success for 4-year-olds from low-income households. The center will be housed in a six-classroom mobile unit at Oceanair Elementary.
A key component of Nichols' budget is his goal to raise academic standards for all students. He attempts to address a disparity that the school system has grappled with for years: how to engage academically gifted students while accommodating low-achievers, many of them poor, inner-city kids at risk of dropping out.
There's money only to begin laying groundwork for the most ambitious programs. Nichols, for example, sets aside $50,000 for Granby's International Baccalaureate program, enough to train teachers and buy textbooks.
The $20,000 Nichols budgeted to spark student interest in advanced math courses seems modest. But Margaret Saunders, assistant superintendent for instruction, said the money will go a long way. It will be used to train a cadre of teachers - who, in turn, will instruct other teachers - and to buy calculators and ``manipulatives'' for ``hands-on'' lessons that help children grasp abstract concepts.
And in a sign that things can't be all that bad, Nichols has included $25,654 to add boys volleyball as a high school varsity sport. He also adds $56,914 to reinstate boys baseball and girls softball as junior varsity sports, both eliminated by budget cuts before Nichols took over the system in summer 1993.
``I thought that was a mistake,'' Nichols said. ``I feel that what urban school systems must do is provide as many wholesome after-school projects for students as they can. It gives them something do to and keeps them off the street.''
In the restrictive fiscal climate school officials are weathering, the budget contains the possibility of pain.
More than 75 positions are targeted for elimination, the result of cost-cutting measures and the loss of federal Chapter 1 funds used to enhance educational opportunities for poor preschool and elementary kids.
Nichols said he hoped the employees could be placed in other jobs created through attrition or a shift in funds to other programs.
For example, while there will be less Chapter 1 money to go around, the 13 elementary schools with the highest concentration of poor students will actually get more than they do now. That should create jobs to absorb displaced employees at the 14 schools that will lose the federal funds.
Some employees might be transferred to the new early childhood center at Oceanair, which will accommodate kids who attended separate programs at six of the schools losing funds.
``I would hate to give any guarantees, but that's our goal,'' Nichols said.
While the relationship between employees and the central administration often seems adversarial, the typical rough-and-tumble negotiations with the city's two teachers' groups over raises has been much tamer so far. Negotiators agreed on a raise that keeps up with inflation and doesn't shortchange veteran teachers.
``I've got to give the administration credit,'' said Marian Flickinger, president of the Norfolk Federation of Teachers. ``We saw movement to address our concerns and come up with realistic solutions.''
Not everybody is happy. The proposed cuts fall heaviest on the system's classified workers - the secretaries, custodians, teachers' aides and other relatively low-paid employees, who nonetheless perform vital services.
The budget, for instance, targets 17 custodial jobs and 15 teachers' aides who work in special education. Nearly 30 Chapter 1 positions would be eliminated.
School Board members say they saved $641,236 by hiring a new contractor to oversee cleaning the schools, but much of the savings is coming from eliminating positions.
``If we are to maintain schools properly, we cannot continue to reduce our work force,'' Richard Bell, head custodian at Granby High, told School Board members at a budget hearing last week.
Classified workers advancing in seniority have not received scheduled pay-step increases of 4.6 percent for the past four years.
This year, the administration has offered classified personnel 3.2 percent across-the-board raises, but employees are worried about an administration proposal to increase the number of pay steps to 22 from 10 and reduce the step raise to 2.3 percent. They said it would take them twice as long to reach the top of the pay scale.
``Reducing our earning potential is not good news to us,'' Deborah Northrup, a teacher assistant who works with emotionally disturbed children, told the School Board. ``Please do not make a decision without understanding the consequences to employees.''
Chairman Turner said the board would revisit the pay issue and try to be ``sensitive'' to the needs of classified employees.
In a system that has been criticized as too top heavy, Nichols has drawn fire for a proposal to create two administrative positions and to spend $175,000 on a ``community information'' initiative.
For $64,440, Nichols wants to hire someone to coordinate the school system's participation in Virginia High School League sports activities and oversee the community's use of school facilities.
He also wants to hire an energy manager, who for $64,752 would come up with ways for the schools to save on power bills. Nichols said both positions would save money in the long run.
``We know that we can save the energy manager's salary time and time again,'' he said.
Critics aren't sure it's such a good use of money.
``We question the necessity of adding more layers of bureaucracy,'' said Charlene Christopher, president of the Education Association of Norfolk. ``There was a serious shortage of substitutes available for our classrooms this year. Additional funds should be spent where it counts most, in the classrooms working with students.''
The information initiative is geared to counter what school officials believe is a generally negative public perception of the city's schools.
``I have no doubt that Norfolk public schools have an image problem,'' Nichols said. ``I think the general attitude is that it's a typical inner-city school system. But it's not typical - it's a cut above most urban systems.''
School Board members will have final say on Nichols' recommendations. They plan to spend the next two weeks poring over it and suggesting changes before adopting it on March 23.
Member Joe Waldo, for instance, said he wanted to respond to parents upset over the late-morning start of elementary schools. The solution probably would require more money to buy buses, but, Waldo said, he's determined to find it.
``I'm not satisfied that we've identified all the savings that are achievable,'' Waldo said. ``I think you'll see the board turn over a lot of stones until more money is found.'' MEMO: The photo-illustration on this week's Compass cover is by staff
photographer Charlie Meads.
by CNB