Potential cuts threaten future of education

IRONWOOD — Local education officials warn that the Western Upper Peninsula could face disastrous consequences if nothing is done to prevent the state from slashing the amount districts receive in per-pupil funding.

Officials told the Daily Globe that if the drastic cuts are imposed, local districts would have to go beyond the normal measures taken in tough times — from the elimination of electives and school-sponsored sports to layoffs and possibly even state takeovers.

“These are generational decisions that are going to absolutely affect students, and their kids, and their kids, and their kids,” Watersmeet superintendent Gerald Pease said. “This is going to be a generational drop-back, in a sense, that’s going to affect the education of generations of students. And you can’t get around that.”

Pease, Gogebic-Ontonagon Intermediate School District Superintendent Alan Tulppo, and the other five GOISD superintendents recently sat down virtually with the Daily Globe to discuss the detrimental effect state cuts to education funding would have on the region and its students.

Although the state hasn’t announced specific figures, the group said that without intervention they’ve been told it’s a matter of how much rather than if cuts happen.

“We don’t have a firm sense of a number we’re looking at. We’ve been given a range of $650-per-student to $700-per-student reduction in the foundation allowance. We’ve also been told there’s a potential this year for districts to be prorated on their funding for the 2019-2020 school year, which means there would be a reduction in the remaining state aid payments to districts for this current school year,” Tulppo said. “We’ve also been told that, absent any additional federal action — so if there’s not another CARES Act or the HEROES Act that’s currently in the U.S. Senate, absent any action on that — the cuts will go into effect.”

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The potential cuts come as the state of Michigan struggles with steep declines in revenue as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. The Detroit Free Press reported in early May that state tax revenues in April were down 43% from one year ago, and The Associated Press reported Thursday the state is facing a nearly $6.3 billion revenue hole this fiscal year and the next.

“What we’re hearing from the legislators is ‘cut, cut, cut,’” Ewen-Trout Creek Superintendent Dave Radovich said. “They’re talking about cutting transportation, cutting athletic programs — that’s all we’re hearing from them, is ‘make your cuts.’”

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Whatever the severity of the cuts are, the superintendents say any reductions to the roughly $8,000 the districts receive per pupil would be harmful.

“Education is already underfunded — woefully, I would even say embarrassingly, underfunded in the state of Michigan. And now we’re going to take that setting and say, ‘Gosh guys, we need you to make deeper cuts,’” Ironwood Superintendent Travis Powell said. “If education is an organism, we have nothing non-vital left to give. So if we’re going to make cuts, we are taking a look at which organ do I need less than another, which limb could I survive without?”

Regardless of current funding levels, the prospect of needing to reduce what their districts offer is especially upsetting to the superintendents who feel they and their colleagues have gone above and beyond in responding to the pandemic.

“Our schools have played a very important role in making sure that life for our students has remained as normal as possible. We’ve been asked to step up and provide childcare, we’ve been asked to step up and make sure kids remain fed — that they’re getting meals on a daily basis — that education continues as usual, that we keep our employees on the payroll,” Tulppo said. “We’ve stepped up to the challenge of providing an education and supporting students, so the news that we’re all going to be receiving a potentially devastating cut is very upsetting and disheartening.”

The possibility of cuts in the 2019-2020 school year — when there are only weeks left in the budget year and the funds have either been spent or earmarked — is a particular source of frustration as schools had to submit Continuity of Learning Plans laying out their transition to remote learning, including provisions preventing layoffs, in order to continue receiving state aid following Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s decision to cancel face-to-face classes in March due to the virus. However, the superintendents now say they are being told the state may fall significantly short of meeting its end of that bargain.

“That is so underhanded I can’t even find the words that are even remotely printable to describe that. The state said, ‘Here’s the deal, you continue to provide services for students; we’ll provide you your state aid, we’ll move forward with this,’” Powell said. “We go through all of that, we expend all this money, we keep people off the unemployment rolls by keeping them employed as district employees … and now in the 11th hour, they go, ‘Oh, we were way off, sorry we’re going to take some money from you.’ No, that just doesn’t even track.”

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A $700-per-pupil cut this year would translate to roughly $525,000 less in revenue for Ironwood, Powell said, which would have a direct impact on the health of the district and “potentially cause a downward spiral.”

“If we have to make up a $500,000 deficit this year, … our district is essentially bankrupt. We’re going to have … a negative fund balance at that point,” Powell said. “And then next year, we’ll have to make cuts in order to not go even further because the state of Michigan still says you have to have a 5% fund balance — that’s their expectation.”

The situation becomes even bleaker if the $700 reduction is carried over to next year’s funding levels, according to Powell, as Ironwood would need to reduce expenditures by $1 million over two years in a district that has an annual budget of roughly $8 million — with 87% of that tied up in salaries and benefits.

Powell said Ironwood likely couldn’t survive those reductions — it would take massive salary cuts and the elimination of every non-essential program to even come close to a balanced budget.

“And then what’s left? I don’t believe what would be left would be desirable for a family to send their child to get educated in that setting,” Powell said, adding Ironwood would be a shell of what it is now.

“For the size of school that we are, and the amount of cuts we would have to make in order to make up that deficit, we could not provide the quality of instruction for families that they deserve — that they expect from us and that we are currently able to provide.

“It’s absolutely unconscionable that we would be expected to make any cuts, let alone cuts to this magnitude,” he continued.

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Ironwood isn’t unique in its inability to handle the potential cuts to the current school year’s funding, with nearly all the superintendents saying their districts would be facing six-figure reductions in aid if the $700 reduction is carried out and doubling those figures if the cuts carry over into next year.

“Now you’re looking at … (cutting) a budget that’s (already sparse), we’re scratching by now cutting every little thing we can,” said Radovich.

The superintendents say they are also being told districts may be expected to continue offering expanded services in the fall as the effects from the pandemic are expected to continue.

“Our families, our students’ lives … have been disrupted. They’re telling us we need to expand and be prepared to expand our emotional-behavioral supports for kids when they come back in the fall, … we’re being told we have to ensure that every kid is up to speed as far as proficiency and … we need to be prepared to provide compensatory education, which is outside of the regular school day, which is an additional cost for every school district,” said Jim Bobula, superintendent-principal in Ontonagon. “But then in the very next breath, our legislators and our government are telling us they’re going to take potentially $200,000 to half a million away from our district and we’re expected to provide these extra services — which is impossible.”

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The situation has also caused additional stress to staff members who are already dealing with a transition to remote learning and living through a pandemic.

“I get emails on a weekly basis (from) particularly your younger teachers and your elective teachers (asking), ‘Are we going to have a job next year? What are you going to do with our program?’” Radovich said. “It’s really stressed these young people out and then the ones that are teaching electives, it’s going to be a hard summer for those people because we’re not going to know exactly what we’re going to have to cut.”

E-TC will need to make “deep cuts” to its budget if the funding situation isn’t resolved in the 2021-2022 school year, according to Radovich.

“You’ll see programs that are decimated, families that are decimated, communities that are decimated,” Radovich said. “I think Ewen is not unique; any small community, the school is the center of the community — it’s the social hub, it’s media for entertainment and as we start cutting programs and teachers, it’s going to decimate these schools and communities.”

The superintendents worry the budget cuts will lead to students leaving the district — triggering a steeper decline in the financial health of districts.

“Right now we have a full-time art program, we have a full-time choir and band, (we have) athletics,” Bessemer Superintendent Dan Niemi said. “If you can’t offer the frills, the extra stuff people enjoy — grandparents, parents, they all come and watch these sporting events, they watch their kids in choir and band concerts. If that gets cut, we’re looking at losing families and kids, it’s just a simple fact.”

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Throughout the conversation, the superintendents repeatedly emphasized the cuts go beyond numbers on a spread sheet and involve taking money directly from the area’s children.

As border communities, local districts have the additional challenge of competing for students with Wisconsin and a different education funding system across the border.

“We’ve got parents looking at taking their kids out of our schools and running down to the school districts in Wisconsin because they’re funded better,” Pease said.

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In the past, some Michigan districts have found themselves in such dire financial straits that they ceased operations. U.P. schools having been getting the short end of state resources in the past, according to the superintendents, meaning the prospect of local districts ceasing to exist becomes a possibility if the combination of state aid reductions and families leaving hit them hard enough.

“We’ve done more with less for decades,” Tulppo said. “These cuts will hurt Upper Peninsula districts the hardest — we have less to cut … there’s nothing left without making cuts that will impact the overall health and viability of the district.

“So yes, it’s a possibility that many districts across the state would be impacted to the level that they might need to dissolve, they might need to look at alternative structures of operations.”

On the topic of the cuts leading to local consolidation, Tulppo said combining local districts won’t do anything to solve the underlying problems with how Michigan funds K-12 education.

“You merge a district, but then you still have the same lack of resources, you still have the same structural, financial challenges that exist — it doesn’t solve anything,” Tulppo said.

The frustrations around the potential cuts are further compounded by the fact districts will most likely only find out the exact amounts after their budgets are due.

“They’re saying there will be no extension of the deadline for budgets, budgets will still be due June 30. We probably won’t know what we’re actually dealing with until after that,” Powell said. “It’s insane, but that’s our reality.”

Although there has been some assistance from the federal government, the superintendents say more is needed.

“Similar to Ewen and Ontonagon, Wakefield-Marensico will lose $200,000 this current year if they choose to go back retroactively and $200,000 next year. The amount of money we’re getting in the CARES Act is $74,000,” said Wakefield-Marenisco Superintendent Jason Gustafson. “So not even a drop in the hat of what we need. They’re saying, ‘Here’s $74,000, but we’re taking $400,000’ — not helpful.”

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Ultimately, the superintendents say it might be up to the communities to save their schools by contacting their state and federal representatives.

“Right now we need to see action on that piece of legislation — the HEROES Act — that’s in the U.S. Senate. If there’s not some type of action on that that allows for public education in states to use that money to offset budget deficits and shortfalls in revenue, these cuts will become a reality,” Tulppo said. “Our elected officials, they’ve been responsive … but they hear from us all the time. We really need our members of the public — our parents, grandparents, people who care about education — to get in touch with them.”

“If you don’t want to see this level of impact on your local schools, you need to write the elected officials who are in charge of deciding what’s going to happen with funding,” Powell said.