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Source: Ocala Star-Banner, Fla.迷你倉新蒲崗Aug. 08--School Board member Nancy Stacy wants to forgo filling 10 lead bus driver positions and slice the teacher training budget in lieu of using full-time substitutes in 2013-14.Stacy believes the cuts can generate most of the $1.8 million needed to shift 100 state-certified substitute teaching positions back to full time.The district announced in May that it intended to use full-time substitutes to save money. Full-time subs get paid $100 per day -- roughly half that of a first-year teacher who makes $36,000 annually -- and receive no district-paid health care benefits. These subs must have a bachelor's degree and a state teaching certificate.Because funds are tight, Superintendent of Schools George Tomyn in May announced the layoffs of 261 employees -- including all 160 first-year teachers -- to balance the 2013-14 budget. Even with the downsizing, he is still planning to use $3 million in excess reserve funds to balance the budget.After many retirements and resignations, nearly all of the 160 laid-off teachers were offered full-time jobs. At least 90 agreed to be reinstated full time, while others rejected offers after finding jobs elsewhere.Stacy said the district has lived without lead bus drivers and can wait another year to fill the openings. She also believes the $2.3 million the district budgeted for teacher training is too much."My No. 1 priority is the classroom, not training," Stacy said after Thursday's work session.The district created the 10 new supervisory bus driving positions this year to train new drivers, observe routes, and fill in when desperately needed.Chester Gregory, the district's deputy superintendent of operations, said these drivers are needed for safety since the district transports about 25,000 students daily to and from school. The supervisor can ride on a route with a driver and hopefully avoid an incident similar to the 2012 videotaped bus beating that involved several Liberty Middle School students.The positions will cost the district about $600,000, including salaries and benefits, officials estimated.The district will break down the costs and present the information to the board at the Aug. 22 budget workshop.School Board 迷你倉出租ember Angela Boynton said she didn't agree with cutting bus trainers, stating the cost of them now will save the district in lawsuit costs in the future. Bus safety should be a top priority, she noted.After Stacy questioned teacher training, officials said the state requires the district to provide teachers with "so many" hours of training annually, depending on every teacher's time or service and specialty.Those training sessions, often referred to as in-service training, keeps the teachers up-to-date with ever-changing requirements.Pam Brewer, the district's executive director of K-12 Academic Services, said a part of the training is to also prepare for the new complex state-mandated Common Core State Standards curriculum.Common Core is part of the new national education road map that most states have adopted to replace No Child Left Behind.Common Core, which will be fully implemented statewide in fall 2014, leaves behind -- for the most part -- the curriculum-based Sunshine State Standards to focus on critical thinking through comparison and contrast.The new concept is designed to better prepare students for college, as well as help those students heading directly into the workforce after high school graduation.Brewer said the district needs to be following a different academic path, considering the county has been losing ground on the state on the FCAT. She also said the district must rethink how it teaches its students to keep Marion from sliding even further."Training is a key to that," she said.Stacy said she wanted a breakdown of how much of the training is required by the state and how much is optional. She hopes about half the training funds, or about $1 million, may can be used to upgrade the subs."It may not be the lack of training for the dropping (FCAT) scores," Stacy said after the meeting. "It could be that morale is the reason. Teachers are tired of seeing the district doing these things (like creating full-time subs)."Contact Joe Callahan at 867-4113 or joe.callahan@starbanner.com. Follow me on Twitter at JoeOcalaNews.Copyright: ___ (c)2013 Ocala Star-Banner (Ocala, Fla.) Visit the Ocala Star-Banner (Ocala, Fla.) at .ocala.com Distributed by MCT Information Services儲存倉