Advanced Class in Economics

Every school district in Orange County will get a share of newly allocated federal funds to hire teachers and train the ones it has.

California recently received $129 million of that; more than $7 million will go to Orange County.

The biggest windfall is headed for Santa Ana Unified School District, slated to receive $1.4 million. Anaheim elementary and high school districts together are eligible for almost $1 million, and the Garden Grove district for about $950,000.

Receiving the least will be the Orange County Department of Education, which oversees certain countywide programs, and Laguna Beach, the county’s smallest unified district, with $31,971.

“This money will definitely help us,” Garden Grove schools Trustee Lynn Hamtil said. But she says she hopes the government doesn’t “get carried away with saying where all the money has to be spent.”

Her fear, echoed by school officials throughout the county, is that the money will arrive with strings attached--perhaps so many that the schools won’t be able to use it.

Grants Can Help With Credentials

Although primarily designed for hiring teachers, in certain circumstances the grants can be used to help teachers obtain their credentials or for teacher mentoring.

About one in seven of the state’s 350,000 teachers have emergency teaching credentials; 300,000 more will probably be needed in the next decade to cope with an influx of new students, with retirements and attrition.

The federal program earmarked $1.3 billion as part of a seven-year drive to hire 100,000 teachers and reduce class sizes to 20 students per teacher in the lower elementary grades in all states.

The funding in California complements about $1.43 billion the state has set aside for hiring teachers.

Because California has largely met that class-size goal for kindergarten through third grade, the state got federal permission to place the newly funded teachers in high schools, said Christine Rodrigues, state Department of Education consultant for class-size reduction.

The state began its class-size-reduction program in 1996, and at this point 99% of all districts in the state are participating in kindergarten through third grade, Rodrigues said.

But whether the federal government will continue to pay for new teaching positions created with this money is uncertain, and districts that aren’t careful could find themselves with new teachers and no way to pay them in following years, after grants run out.

“We’re super-cautious,” Hamtil said, “and we’ll find a way to work it in so that if it’s money that is cut off next year, we won’t suffer for it.”

The Anaheim Union High School District, crowded with students and stretched thin for teacher funding, also is looking forward to the federal money.

“Our classes are all huge, and they’ve been getting larger and larger and larger and larger,” said board President L.E. “Slim” Terrell. “We would like to raise salaries for teachers, but even before salaries I just hope we can get enough teachers.”

Capistrano Unified School District officials also hope to have enough teachers. Capistrano Unified is one of the state’s fastest-growing districts, with about 2,000 new students a year.

“We always need new teachers,” school board President Sheila Benecke said.

Because of the boom in students and dearth of teachers, maintaining a 20-1 ratio in classrooms has taxed Capistrano’s resources.

“We’ve had to create new classes in May in order not to go over the limit,” Benecke said. “Hopefully things won’t be that bad next year.”