LORAIN, Ohio — Nearly a week after sweeping cuts were approved in Lorain City Schools, families and staff are grappling with the gravity of the district’s financial situation.
“It’s very stressful. It’s very heavy. As one of my members said, when you walk into the building, you can feel how heavy it is - the atmosphere,” said Julie Garcia, the president of the Lorain Education Association (LEA).
Last week, the school board approved a plan to cut 167 staff members, including 106 members of the LEA, which covers teachers, counselors, speech-language pathologists and social workers.
RELATED: More than 100 teachers to be cut from Lorain City Schools
Garcia described the cuts as “devastating.” She said the union does not yet know which staff members will be losing their jobs.
“It’s tense. Unfortunately, people are turning on other people. It’s getting ugly,” she said.
Families told News 5 they were also concerned about the number of staff being eliminated.
“To see that they’re losing that many, that saddens me. It really does because what about those kids that need that teacher?” said Lorain parent and grandparent Julie Mincy.
Others raised concerns about additional changes, including plans to consolidate the district’s 10 elementary schools into eight buildings. Two former elementary schools will be turned into a half-day preschool building and a specialized school for students with autism.
Additionally, the district plans to reduce electives, including dance, choir, health, and middle school-level Spanish; eliminate field trips; and decrease summer school programming.
“These kids need more. They always need more because when they get out here in the real world, they’re really not going to know what to do,” said grandmother Karen Jobe.
Lorain City Schools leaders said the cuts are the result of reduced federal, state and local funding. They said they tried to preserve student learning while balancing the district’s financial future.
“There’s a lot of things that we used to be able to provide our children and our families that, moving forward, we’re going to struggle with,” Superintendent Jeff Graham said during Thursday’s Board of Education meeting.
Earlier this month, the district laid out its proposal to cut nearly $18 million from its budget.
RELATED: Lorain City Schools weighs staffing cuts, consolidations as it trims $18 million from budget
This week, it debuted a presentation called “Our Path Forward” on its social media. The images gave a more detailed breakdown of how staff reductions will be distributed through grade levels.
The bulk of the cuts will come at the elementary level, where 57 teachers and 15 other staff positions will be eliminated. In pre-K, 11 teachers and more than two dozen other staff are being cut. Middle school restructuring will reduce LEA staff by 23. The high school will lose two positions. Sixteen cuts will come at the administrative level.
Garcia said, “It means there are going to be fewer supports for our families, for our students.”
As of Wednesday afternoon, she said the union did not know who within those positions would be affected.
“I’m just keeping my head above the water, just waiting to hear. It’s almost like I’m waiting for an axe to drop. And then when that happens, who knows what’s going to happen,” said Garcia.
She expects to learn more details in the coming days. News 5 will continue following the developments in this story.
