‘I thought I would retire here’: PVUSD teachers face final days in the classroom as pink slips arrive

Joel Domhoff walked from one group of students to another, checking in as they worked on projects for his video production class at Aptos High School one afternoon last week. He helped students solve editing issues and gave advice for their projects – for what might be the last group he teaches this course to at the school. 

Domhoff is one of 30 teachers who received layoff notices this month from Pajaro Valley Unified School District. In late February, the governing board approved layoffs for 60.55 full-time-equivalent employees to help the district stay fiscally solvent. District officials began handing out the notices over two weeks ago.  

“I was, frankly, in shock,” Domhoff said about getting a pink slip. He’s taught video production at Aptos High for the past 12 years. “I thought I was going to retire here.” 

Theater arts teacher Georgette Messa hadn’t finished her first year on the job at Ann Soldo Elementary and Lakeview Middle schools when she received her layoff notice on March 14. School administrators were very apologetic, she said.

“I immediately wept,” said Messa, who serves as many as 500 students a week from transitional kindergarten through eighth grade. “Because so much was dependent on our move, on my son, our insurance.”

Messa and her husband had their first child in August 2023 and made the move to California last year from San Antonio, Texas, to be closer to her husband’s family in Soquel. 

She doesn’t know what she’ll do if she isn’t able to keep her position. Her husband is a music teacher and a professional musician who performs with different organizations such as the San Francisco Symphony. Because of that, his work is sometimes infrequent, she said.

The district has until May 15, by law, to inform the teachers if they will ultimately be laid off. In the meantime, 27 teachers are appealing the layoff notices and requested a hearing, incoming teachers union president Brandon Diniz told Lookout. Diniz thinks that the district might have made errors in whom it targeted for potential layoffs. 

“We have people who were served a layoff notice who have been in the district for 20 years and people who were served a layoff notice who have tenure,” he said. “But people with less seniority weren’t served a layoff notice.” 

Diniz said seven notices were sent to teachers at Aptos High School, five at Pajaro Valley High, three at Watsonville High and three at Renaissance High Continuation, among others. 

Messa said she was particularly surprised by the layoff notice because the district had hired her last summer. “So it seems weird that they would have just hired a position that now they’re telling me they actually don’t need,” she said. “It seems like they should have assessed that need before hiring me.”

She was excited about building theater arts programming at the two schools and hopes that she will still have the chance to start that work. “I’m here to build a legacy,” she said. “I have big plans for both campuses.” 

Messa is not certain what theater arts will look like at the schools but said that administrators remained driven to keep theater arts programming. 

At Watsonville High School, U.S. history ethnic studies teacher Meghan Ueland got emotional sitting in her forest-themed classroom Friday, thinking about all the work she put into making it an appealing space for her students and how she could have to take it all down after receiving a layoff notice.  

“It was just devastating, soul-crushing,” she said about getting a notice. “I’m still just completely and utterly devastated over it. Everything at my school has been going excellently. If you look in my classroom – many people comment that I have one of the nicest rooms in the department.” 

She said sometimes students ask to sit in her classroom during breaks. Ueland is in her second year of teaching and loves her students. 

“I totally have rooted myself here with the students, we have great rapport,” she said, tearing up. “They’re devastated too.”

At Aptos High School, Domhoff teaches more than 100 students across four classes of introductory video production and one class of the more advanced video production 2 course.

He has a list of 40 students who have told him they want to take the advanced video production course for next year, but he doesn’t think he’ll be returning after getting the layoff notice. 

Domhoff teaches students everything from how to use cameras to how to edit videos using Adobe software and how to make documentaries. The students also earn money by taking on jobs creating videos while in the course. 

In January, Domhoff’s students helped televise a countywide flag football game at Santa Cruz High School on KCBA Fox 35. His nonprofit, the Gino Panelli Foundation, raised money by selling advertising and paid the students who filmed and worked the event.

“I had like eight or 10 students in there, filming, doing statistics, doing all kinds of stuff, production jobs,” he said, adding that they each made $50 for that work. 

The students also produce music videos of high school bands and short video clips of the Aptos High sports teams. He thinks at minimum, students make about $250 doing projects in video production 2.

Juniors Hannah Levy and Carina Kessler, both 17, said they were surprised and sad when they heard Domhoff had gotten a layoff notice. 

“I was so shocked. We were in math class, and my friend’s little brother texted her and was like, ‘Domhoff’s being laid off!’ recalled Kessler. “And we’re both like, ‘What?! How?’ He’s just such a sweet guy. He’s an amazing teacher.” 

Kessler and Levy are working on a documentary about feminism in Domhoff’s video production 2 class this year, which they want to submit to a film contest. Kessler first took Domhoff’s introductory video production course as a first-year student because her sister, who is four years older, told her it was one of her favorite classes. 

“And I know that some of my friends have been telling their siblings, ‘You should sign up for this class,’” said Kessler. “So it’s really sad to know that they aren’t going to be able to have this experience. It’s been a super fun class for us to take.”

Kessler and Levy added that the video production course, like many other electives and career technical education (CTE) courses, has given the students the opportunity to learn new skills in a creative way that they don’t often get a chance to in core classes like English or sciences. 

“We, as a group of women, are passionate about feminism and about making sure people know about that,” said Kessler. “This class gives us the opportunity to look into that and to learn about that and then to express ourselves within it. Besides CTE classes and art classes, no other class really does that.” 

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