Glendale : No Cuts for Administrators

The board of education voted 3 to 2 Tuesday to reject proposals to decrease the salaries of top administrators and other district personnel to help salvage student programs expected to be cut in June.

Board members Jane Whitaker and Sharon Beauchamp, advocates of salary cuts, presented the two proposals as alternatives to a list of reductions presented to the board recently by Supt. Robert Sanchis to offset an anticipated $6.7-million shortfall. Board members Charles Whitesell, Blanche Greenwood and June Sweetnam voted against the proposals.

Those proposed cuts would eliminate counselors, psychologists, librarians, a $496,631 at-risk program for troubled children and other student services. Class size would also be increased.

More than a dozen teachers, parents and students urged the board to reject the proposed cuts.

Eight of the district’s 25 counseling positions would be trimmed, saving $168,600.

Teachers also opposed an increase in class size in Glendale junior high schools from an average of 31 to 33 and from 32 to 34 in high schools.

“I’m using every trick in my ever-expanding bag of tricks to deal with 34 to 40 students,” said Kate Guggan, a social studies teacher at Roosevelt Junior High.