Quick Take
Pajaro Valley Unified School District administrators are proposing to eliminate 17 assistant principal positions at elementary schools next academic year, a move that has alarmed teachers already reeling from roughly 160 recent layoffs. Union leaders and educators say the cuts could strain school operations, jeopardize safety and place additional burdens on teachers and principals.
Pajaro Valley Unified School District administrators are proposing eliminating the district’s 17 elementary school assistant principals starting next academic year, according to the teachers union.
Amesti Elementary science teacher Rachel Hitchcock said she was “extremely dismayed” and “it took the wind out of my sails” when she learned late last month that her school and others would lose their assistant principals.
“I’ve been through a lot: furlough days, massive layoffs, big classes,” said Hitchcock, who has taught at the school for 25 years. ”But this one is hitting me very, very hard, and I feel extremely discouraged and very concerned about next year.”
Assistant principals, also called academic coordinators, work at each of the 17 elementary schools in the district. They support principals and teachers by overseeing testing, assisting with student discipline and attending meetings with families about students with disabilities, among many other tasks. The elimination of the assistant principals comes weeks after the school board approved about 160 layoffs, including all of the district’s 13 mental health clinicians, dozens of teachers and more than 40 special education positions.
Lookout asked PVUSD district spokesperson Alejandro Chavez for comment and details about these layoffs on Friday. As of Monday evening, he hadn’t responded. He didn’t answer questions about why the district decided to eliminate these jobs, when the decision was made and if it was part of the district’s effort to address its budget deficit.
Teachers union president Brandon Diniz said he didn’t see these cuts coming and that teachers are concerned that eliminating these positions will jeopardize school safety.
“The union saying we need administrators — crazy talk, right?” he said about the assistant principals. “That’s how egregious these cuts are.”
Diniz said cutting assistant principals at schools doesn’t make sense, particularly at a time when so many support positions have been lost to layoffs: mental health clinicians, counselors, special education staff and many others. He added that he feels this decision was made “unilaterally” and without any transparency.
“I think we are going to see principals leave this district and refuse to work without having an academic coordinator [assistant principal],” he said.
Diniz said the district’s human resources department director informed him about the elimination of the positions the last week of January and Diniz emailed the teachers shortly after with the news. He said because the positions are administrative, he doesn’t believe any kind of layoff process is required to cut the roles, as is needed for other employees. He added that the district said the laid-off assistant principals would be offered other administrative or teaching jobs within PVUSD.
Hitchcock, the Amesti Elementary teacher, said by removing the assistant principal position the district is also “losing a principal pipeline.”
She added that without their assistant principals, teachers will have to do even more substitute teaching during their prep periods. Hitchcock said her school has struggled to find subs to fill in for teacher absences, so teachers and the assistant principal have to step in.
“I know that the budget needs to be addressed,” she said “But it feels like all the choices that are being made are going to put more work on the backs of people who have direct interaction with students.”
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