Layoffs hitting Washington teachers hard

When they landed teaching jobs in the Issaquah School District in the fall of 2007, the Millers — Jayme, his wife, Andrea, and his sister Sarah — couldn't believe their good fortune.

All three had grown up and gone to school in Issaquah. In their mid-20s, enthusiastic and full of energy, they found their first full-time jobs as teachers in the very place where they all wanted to be: home.

Then the economy started going south. Still, Sarah Miller reasoned, "They'll always need teachers."

So it was a shock earlier this month when Issaquah sent layoff notices to 158 of its 1,097 certificated teachers, all with three or fewer years of experience.

This fall, unless they're recalled to work, the Millers will all be out of jobs.

Districts across the state are either slashing teaching jobs or planning to put a freeze on hiring to deal with $800 million in public-school money cut by the Washington Legislature in the session that just ended. Most of that money was cut from Initiative 728, the class-size reduction initiative passed by voters in 2000.

Between 3,000 and 5,000 public-school teachers in Washington could be out of a job by this fall, at a time when many economists expect the unemployment rate to still be climbing. The cuts will land hardest on the least experienced — many of them young, passionate teachers who have just launched their careers.

And hundreds of college students who will graduate from teaching programs this spring — including people who changed careers and went back to school to become teachers — are finding that education jobs in this state have largely evaporated.

"This has been gut-wrenching for us," said Ron Thiele, associate superintendent of Issaquah schools, who said the district must cut $10.5 million. That total will include teachers and other cuts, including some administrative positions. "I can tell you, we've all added a significant amount of gray hair this spring. We know there are faces behind these numbers."

Most Washington districts have a May 15 deadline to let teachers know whether they have a job next fall, so a wave of layoff notices will be issued this week.

Because districts tend to be conservative, a number of those laid off will probably be hired back by this fall. Issaquah, for example, could recall 60 or 70 of the 158 teachers. Still, the Washington Education Association has called it the worst teacher cutbacks in the state in 30 years.

With employees accounting for more than 80 percent of most school-district budgets, teacher cutbacks are an obvious place to go to trim the budget. Still, not every district will be sending layoff notices. Some districts expect to receive federal stimulus money. Others will need to make fewer cuts because more of their staffers are retiring, resigning or going on leave.

The Seattle district, the state's largest, hopes to avoid teacher layoffs by drawing on cash reserves and other cuts, and it has frozen new hires. The district's teaching force will shrink, however, because as teachers retire, their jobs won't be filled. Class sizes will probably increase by one student in fourth and fifth grades.

Officials in the Lake Washington district, which needed to cut $7.7 million, originally thought they would need to cut about 80 teaching positions. But in a series of community meetings, it quickly became clear that parents were willing to sacrifice to avoid making class sizes go up, spokeswoman Kathryn Reith said.

The district is closing the gap by eliminating 10 administrative positions, cutting the central-office and building-operating budgets, and increasing the fees for all-day kindergarten and sports participation, among other steps.

"A lot of work went into finding creative ways to save money," Reith said. PTA members have promised to raise money to help families who can't afford the new fees — a step that's possible in Lake Washington, a district that includes Redmond and Kirkland, because many of its parents make a good living.

The fact that some districts are able to cut the budget without eliminating jobs has raised questions about whether job cuts are always necessary.

In the Kent district, the equivalent of 38 full-time teaching positions are in jeopardy. The Kent Education Association has called for the district to cut a larger portion of administrative staff and make up some of the $7 million shortfall by using reserve funds.

"We believe if there need to be any cuts, they need to keep them as far away from the classroom as possible," association president Lisa Brackin-Johnson said.

Because the teacher cuts are so widespread, those facing layoffs say they don't know where else to look for a job.

"Where are you going to go?" asked Mikael Carlson, an Issaquah school psychologist who received a layoff notice. "Where are you supposed to find work?"

Carlson is likely to be called back to work because she has a hard-to-replace skill, but some of her friends are looking for jobs as far away as Alaska and Nevada — two states that are still hiring.

The picture is no better for students graduating from teaching schools this spring.

"Across the board, the prospects for our graduates are pretty poor," said Cap Peck, the director of teacher education at the University of Washington. About 150 teachers graduate from the UW program each year, a number of them changing jobs in mid-career to follow a passion for teaching.

In the long run, it's likely that the loss of teacher jobs, like the downturn in the economy, is only temporary. "We're all fairly confident the jobs will come back," Peck said.

But for the Millers, the cuts mean finding interim work or applying for unemployment and scraping by on whatever they can with the hope that the teaching jobs they love will one day open up again.

"People can only wait around for so long," Andrea Miller said.

Katherine Long: 206-464-2219 or klong@seattletimes.com

Information from The Associated Press is included in this report.

The information in this article, originally published May 10, 2009, was corrected July 15, 2009. The Seattle School District does not yet know if it will be able to avoid teacher layoffs for the 2009-10 school year. A story in Sunday's Seattle Times reported that the district would not lay off any teachers next year.