LONGMONT — The fiscally strapped St. Vrain Valley School District tonight may join other school districts in the state that allow parents to pay for more teacher aides in the classroom.
The new policy is being pushed by the parent-teacher advisory council at Niwot Elementary, where it is feared massive cutbacks will lead to fewer teachers, bigger class sizes and scaled-back instruction time.
St. Vrain this year began laying off 85 employees — mostly teachers — to avoid a $4.5 million budget shortfall.
The Niwot group decided to pony up the $18,000-a-year salary for a teacher aide — also known as a paraprofessional — to help give students badly needed one-on-one attention.
“We knew that things were going to get worse and we were going to lose more positions,” said Laura McDonald, president of the school’s parent-teacher group.
The parents lobbied the school board this year to revise a policy that bans parents from subsidizing a paraprofessional’s salary.
The new policy, if adopted, would also allow the district to hire a part-time paraprofessional for $6,500 a year.
The person hired would be an employee of the district and supervised by the building principal, according to the proposed policy change.
St. Vrain joins a trend, with Front Range school districts being forced to look to parents for funds for teacher aides to help overwhelmed instructors in increasingly crowded classrooms, said Jane Urschel, deputy executive director of the Colorado Association of School Boards.
“Unfortunately, there has to be a beg-athon to fund classroom aides,” Urschel said.
This year’s school finance law included money for Head Start and early kindergarten programs as well as for a few more counselors in the state, Urschel said.
More teacher aides, however, were not part of the funding package. This often means parents — worried that students won’t get proper classroom attention — have to pick up the slack, she said.
But that could also mean schools with relatively well-off parents will get the benefit of teacher aides while poorer schools have to do without. “There is always a question of equity,” Urschel said.
The Boulder Valley School District, which has allowed parents to pay for nonlicensed or temporary personnel since 2005, requires schools to share 10 percent of the donated funds with other schools in the district.
“We wanted to include the 10 percent for equity issues,” said Leslie Stafford, the district’s chief financial officer.
St. Vrain officials are eyeing a $14.5 million mill-levy override in November to raise salaries, reduce class sizes and hire some teachers back.
They hope turning to parents to pay for teacher aides is only a temporary, stop-gap measure.
“We should be able to provide for the needs of our students,” said St. Vrain school board president Sandi Searls. “And when we aren’t, we have to be flexible.”
Monte Whaley: 720-929-0907 or mwhaley@denverpost.com
