TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — Tuesday night TUSD’s governing board talked about their financial budget after they decided not to make any changes to their desegregation and equity, diversity and inclusiveness program.
The district said they have some financial decisions to make since their federal, pandemic-era money is going to end in September.
Right now the district and Board is looking into certain jobs in the district, and how they’re being affected by the student to staff ratios.
Jim Byrne, the president of the Tucson Education Association said he’s hoping positions outside of the classroom like social workers and pandemic learning loss interventionists are kept. He said they want to stay in their position within the district.
“Not all education happens in the classroom and the kids don’t spend all their time there and sometimes they need to step out and speak to somebody who’s a trained professional,” Byrne said. “We’ve heard from folks through a number of different communication channels who are nervous, anxious.”
The district said since they are not making any changes, desegregation allocations will still allow roles to stay that focus on learning loss due to the pandemic.
Byrne said teacher assistants and administrative assistants got notified they may be cut, but said he hopes the district has a plan to keep them and even promote them.
“Trying to keep them in the short term but also building a long term plan to see if they have a different career path that they could see this as an opportunity,” he said.
The districts said the administration is recommending that money from the desegregation program be reallocated, but it would not impact their EDI department.
They also said the desegregation program over spent their budget by about 4 million dollars.
The governing board did not make final decisions about the budget, but will be voting on it in two weeks.
When it comes to the budget, Byrne said he hopes they consider all of their employees.
“Part of this is looking at TUSD and seeing what creativity we can find to solve this retention crisis, but also needing political advocacy at the state level,” Byrne said.
