District News

Much has been in the news regarding Governor Newsom’s proposed May revised budget and the significant funding reductions proposed for California’s schools. While the specifics of these cuts were just released, Campbell Union School District (CUSD) staff has been busy looking at the impacts it will have here.

“It’s going to be a very tough year,” said Assistant Superintendent of Administrative Services Nelly Yang. “We were informed of an overall 10% reduction to our Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), as well as cuts to preschool and afterschool funding, and that our June allocation will be deferred, which will impact our cash flow.”

Already faced with the challenges of declining enrollment, rising costs for special education services, and state-imposed increases to pension plan payments, the district had cut $4 million over the past two years, and had planned for additional adjustments for 2020-21. “Now we’ll have to carve much deeper,” Yang said. 

COVID Compounds Impacts

“We reduced expenses, kept vacant positions unfilled, and managed our finances very conservatively,” said Superintendent Shelly Viramontez. “This was all before we were all hit with the unprecedented impact of COVID-19.”

Schools operate within a staff-to-student ratio, so fewer students means fewer teachers and program staff. 

“When program enrollment decreases, the number of staff members needs to adjust accordingly,” she said. “And attrition alone will not get us to the massive reductions we need, so we will have to make some very hard staffing decisions very soon.”

The reductions are coming at a time when districts are planning to need more resources to ensure schools have all of the safety and hygiene equipment needed to bring students and staff back to campuses in the fall. 

For almost 20 years, the district has been able to offer programs beyond what the State funds for TK-8th grade education because its preschool and before and after school programs were self-funded through grants and fees. They even helped to support extras like school plays and counselors. 

Striving to Keep Programs Alive

“We know how valuable these expanded learning and early childhood education programs are, and we are trying to find a way to keep them,” Viramontez said. “We are doing everything we can to see how we might be able to break even on the programs, which is particularly challenging under the current public health childcare limitations of only 10 students in a class.”

“It’s heartbreaking,” she said. “We are profoundly aware of the impacts these choices have on people’s lives. We also have to be able to run our core school-day operations. We will find a way to both hold tight to our core mission and make the many imposing budget decisions based on what is the overall best for student learning throughout our district.”

For more information about how Campbell Union School District is funded, please visit the  “Budget Primer” on the district’s budget web page.

The month of May is filled with special days of recognition: teacher appreciation week, principal day, nurses day, school cafeteria worker day, and others. In Campbell Union School District, we believe every employee is important and deserves recognition, so we celebrate ALL of our employees during one special week. This year, that week is May 25-29.

We so appreciate the work that each of our employees do to educate students to their highest potential—especially through the challenges of these past two months.

Teachers can do marvelous things to spark a love of learning in a child. They don’t do it alone. Behind every aspect of student learning, there is someone providing a service to keep them safe, fed, healthy, equipped, supervised, supported and connected.

We hope you will join us May 25-29 in acknowledging the important work that all of our school and district employees do for the more than 7,000 students in Campbell Union School District.

Click to view this week's video message from Superintendent Viramontez.

Topics include:
• summer and new school year planning;
• request for input from parents through Thoughtexchange; and
• access to community services on our COVID-19 resources page.

“Safety and learning are our top priorities,” said Campbell Union School District Superintendent Shelly Viramontez. “Thanks to a long-established network of community partners—too many to list—we’ve been able to quickly connect students and their families to services and resources that are helping them stay safe and learn during the COVID-19 school closures.”

What started as a temporary, 3-week shut down on March 16th quickly evolved into a situation where more students and their families had greater needs than before. A multi-year grant from School Linked Services (SLS) supplements district funding of Community Liaisons. These school-based staffers were able to immediately start contacting families to determine their needs and connect them to district supports of computer devices and meals as well as local assistance, groceries, diaper kits, gas card donations, informing families of help with rent, cell phone service, internet connectivity, emergency dental services, and much more.

“It is not easy for large systems, like a school district, to make a rapid change because that change can affect so many people in the community,” Viramontez said. “We are fortunate to have a well-established system of support that has allowed us to reach out and respond quickly to our students’ basic needs so that our teachers could pivot and modify lessons that address students’ learning from a distance, both online and in printed packets.”

She added that the district has been able to do so much more than keep students learning and keep students fed, as the Governor specified. 

“An already long list of partners has grown in a few weeks,” she said. “Local businesses and individuals have said yes to our requests and are reaching out to ask how they can help. We are so grateful.”

 Pictured Above: Partners from the City of San Jose and Project HOPE helped more than 60 families sign up for 60 days of free internet service, and provided other information about community resources.

Pictured Left: The district has checked out nearly 3,000 computing devices for students to use, and is working with companies to secure more internet service in district “dead spots”.

Pictured Right: A partnership with Home Church and a team of volunteers is providing 125 bags of groceries per week to district families.