The average student can name every teacher they’ve had since freshman year. The average student cannot name a single school district board member. Yet, the Anaheim Union High School District (AUHSD) Board of Trustees’s decision to lay off 110 teachers shows that, in their eyes, teachers are disposable and students are no more than statistics. Ultimately, the AUHSD fails to prioritize the community it serves, disregarding all it should stand for.
Average Daily Attendance (ADA) dropped from 95% to 91% in the 2022-23 school year. As acknowledged in the March 7 Board of Trustees meeting, the district has been keenly aware of this downward trend in both attendance and enrollment for the past few years. A district this large should not drastically fail to plan ahead and ignore its students’ needs.
In 2020, the Board agreed to hire more teachers to reduce class sizes. Using one-time COVID-19 funding provided by the state, AUHSD chose to hire more teachers — knowing that the funds were temporary. Although the Board claims the district values its teachers by hiring more when other districts focused on purchasing protective pandemic materials, their decision only means they view teachers as disposable as the plexiglass walls that proliferate campuses. To hire teachers with limited funds amid a time of declining enrollment proves that these teachers are nothing more than a means to an end.
Some teachers who received a Reduction in Force (RIF) notice have worked for the AUHSD since 1999, yet may lose their livelihoods. These school site veterans are crucial to their department’s institutional memory. For instance, if all of Oxford’s notified teachers were laid off, that would remove three out of four teachers who have taught in Oxford’s English department for at least 10 years. Through uprooting the department’s faculty, the district erases part of Oxford’s history. In the eyes of the AUHSD, teachers’ hard work and loyalty they have devoted for years are worthless. For those who receive a RIF notice but will not get laid off, there is no guarantee they will remain teaching at the same school site next year — treating teachers and schools as replaceable.
Teachers are the ones who shape students’ lives, who make school sites what they are — not the board members who renovate pool structures and marquees, who fail to address any of their students’ needs. So, who does the Board of Trustees serve, if not their students?
No administrative staff, counselors, or other support staff are being laid off, forcing teachers to inequitably bear the brunt of declining enrollment. Other districts statewide (such as the San Diego Unified School District) are laying off faculty across the board, such as administrative staff and counselors. The March 7 meeting agenda also originally included the discussion of a 4.5% salary increase for the superintendent, assistant superintendents, and District counsel — a tone-deaf notion, especially after years of consistent raises. The superintendent declined this raise. In a situation where budget cuts call for layoffs, it is the management’s responsibility to make a statement of solidarity through taking a pay cut, rather than entertaining the prospect of a raise, even if it is ultimately rejected.
Acutely unaware of what students need within the classroom, the Board also voted to develop an artificial intelligence tutor called sKrappy in eKadence, which has a projected cost of $450,000. Allocating AUHSD’s supposedly dwindling budget into artificial intelligence speaks volumes about how disconnected the Board of Trustees is from its students’ needs and desires.
According to 2022-23 School Accountability Report Cards, every single school located in Anaheim has over 50% of juniors who failed to reach the state standard in all three categories of English Language Arts, Math, and Science for the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress — a concerning notion for a district that prides itself on innovative education through the 5 Cs and Performance Task Assignments. Cutting teachers only furthers the disparity between AUHSD’s quality of education and state levels. With crowded classrooms as a result of less teachers, students slip between the cracks since teachers must divide their attention among more students. Teachers are the ones who recognize when a student is struggling, not artificial intelligence and certainly not distant board members.
Although the AUHSD has focused on attracting foreign exchange students, increasing “cutting-edge” pathways, and providing alternative programming through Cambridge Virtual Academy, this doesn’t address currently enrolled students’ absenteeism. Laying off teachers only reduces morale for students who have lost connections they’ve cultivated for years and who will further feel ignored in larger classes.
Ultimately, the district has lost its purpose. AUHSD has seven core values. The Board of Trustees violates every one of them.
Most glaring is the 5 Cs: The district lacks compassion for the teachers whose livelihoods they have uprooted, failing to communicate an action plan years in advance, collaborate with its faculty, or apply critical thinking in finding a creative compromise. Most hypocritical is that the district believes its mission is “delivered primarily through instruction.” If instruction is as vital to AUHSD as it claims, then teachers should not be the only department bearing the brunt of declining enrollment. Most frustrating is its final core value: “Enhance and strengthen democracy through cultivation of student voice and problem solving.” Despite the many student voices that spoke up at the Board meeting, the district failed to form a compromise with its students.
Teachers are the ones who shape students’ lives, who make school sites what they are — not the board members who renovate pool structures and marquees, who fail to address any of their students’ needs. So, who does the Board of Trustees serve, if not their students?
