Spokane schools to hire teachers

Spokane School District 81 plans to add 114 teachers for the coming school year - a boon to students and to some of the roughly 1,500 teachers looking for jobs in the area's largest district.

"It's truly good news for classroom instruction and lowering class size," Mark Anderson, District 81's associate superintendent of management services, told the school board this week.

Most of the new hires will be paid out of the student achievement fund - more than $5.8 million for the 2001-02 school year - that resulted from the voter passage of state Initiative 728.

Other school districts in the area also plan to hire new teachers, but not to the same degree as District 81.

Approved by nearly 72 percent of voters last November, I-728 provides additional money to help students reach the state's learning standards.

The funds - which come from the state lottery and property taxes - can't be spent on just anything.

The initiative restricts use to class-size reduction, professional development for teachers, early assistance for kids who need pre- kindergarten support and additions to school facilities for the purpose of smaller classes.

Every school district in Washington state will get an estimated $194 per full-time-equivalent student during the 2001-2002 school year, according to the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction. That amount is expected to increase to $220 annually for the following two years and then $450 during the 2004-05 school year.

Local school boards will decide how the money will be used. Most districts statewide have already held a public meeting to get input from the community. Now, they're in the process of finalizing plans, which should be adopted by Aug. 31. Each district must also provide an annual public accounting of the funds.

Central Valley administrators have a creative plan for the $2.1 million they expect to get from I-728 funds. The district will hire a new teacher to serve as a math facilitator for its two high schools, five teachers who will focus half-time on teacher training in the middle schools, and instructional assistants for all kindergarten teachers who don't have classroom help right now.

About 25 to 30 percent of the funds will be used to hire new teachers for kindergarten through fourth grade.

"We feel like our wish list has been met," said curriculum director Tere von Marbod, who's especially happy about funds for teacher aides. "This should be a huge benefit to our kindergartners."

The Cheney School District is well ahead of the Aug. 31 deadline for finalizing plans. It will use the $640,000 in I-728 funds for staff development, extending the school year and class reduction to about 16 students per classroom in kindergarten and first-grade.

With its roughly 7,900 full-time-equivalent students, the Mead School District is scheduled to receive about $1.5 million, but will wait until next month to finalize a plan.

"One of the issues we're facing is the lack of classroom space to lower class size," said Al Swanson, Mead's assistant superintendent for finance. "We want to reduce class size and hire more teachers."

If approved by the school board next month, District 81 plans to spend half of the I-728 money to reduce class sizes in the elementary schools and another 30 percent on middle schools and high schools. The remaining 20 percent will be spent on nonemployee-related costs and professional development.

Parents, however, shouldn't expect their children to suddenly be in classrooms with only a few students, officials said.

Most of the district's 35 elementary schools don't have the space to add new classes, said Superintendent Brian Benzel.

That's why District 81 has chosen a "team teacher model," which will mean some classrooms will have two teachers to ensure that students get more attention, he said. Two teachers would translate into targeted assistance for kids who need help with reading, writing or math, or those who may be at risk of not passing the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) tests.

The team teacher model gives the district "more bang for the buck," said Staci Vesneske, District 81's director for certificated employees. "Having another teacher in the classroom will really help kids."

At the middle school level, the district proposes to use additional teachers for programs that focus on math, reading and science, as well as WASL preparation for at-risk students.

District 81's high schools also will get new teachers for programs targeting at-risk freshmen and sophomores, WASL help and additional classrooms in language arts, math and reading skills.

The added positions will be good news to the 1,500 people with teaching certificates who have applied for teaching positions within District 81.

While most of the country and the west side of the state suffer from a teaching shortage, District 81 has a glut of educators.

The only serious shortage of applicants is in math, Vesneske said.

Last year, the district hired 175 teachers, most of whom replaced others who had retired. District 81 plans to hire about 250 teachers this year - a combination of I-728funded positions and replacements for most of the retirees. Most of those positions will be in the elementary schools.

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