A new budget survey revealed some Orange County school employees are struggling financially with many working second jobs and looking for alternative employment outside the school division.
For the past several years, the Orange County School Board, with help from former Virginia Tech School of Education Dean Dr. Wayne Worner, has anonymously surveyed its employees to determine what their priorities are in developing the next school year’s budget. This year’s survey had several purposes, including prioritizing different salary and benefit options, prioritizing new resource allocations, prioritizing items to be protected if budget cuts have to be made and finding out how employees are reacting to the budget crunch.
Approximately 548 employees participated in the survey, representing almost 75 percent of the school division’s total workforce. With the cost of living having increased and employees not seeing any step increases or raises for going on four years, some of the survey results are not surprising. For instance, when asked to prioritize across salary and benefit options, those responding ranked salary increases, with or without a step increase, as the most favored option, with 221 respondents choosing it as the most important. Maintaining Virginia Retirement Service (VRS) contributions was also ranked slightly higher than maintaining employer health insurance contributions. Currently, the school division covers an employee’s entire contribution to the VRS and all of a single-employee’s insurance contributions.
When asked how to allocate any new resources which may come up, employees chose restoring core content teaching positions as their primary focus, while restoring instructional assistants came in at a close second. Other top choices were restoring school secretary positions, restoring academic intervention and remediation programs and increasing the local match for the purchase of new and replacement computers.
As for what to protect should the school board have to make cuts, 100 percent of employees participating in the survey ranked salaries and wages first, followed by current contributions to health insurance premiums, all current positions, employer contributions to VRS and maintaining class sizes.
The second part of the survey, which dealt with non-budget items, yielded the most interesting responses. Employees were asked to indicate if they maintain employment outside the county, in addition to their work with the school division. Approximately 24.3 percent, or one-in-four, employees indicated that they have an additional job, with the median amount of time worked 11-15 hours weekly. With the wording of the question, Worner said he’s confident that people responding were identifying jobs worked during the school year, not those obtained during the summer.
“With the question, we tried to convey jobs worked during the school year,” he said. “I’m confident that respondents understood the question. But that’s not even the entire picture. A number of people, when giving ways they were cutting back on expenses, said they are working at home to create new resources.”
Superintendent Dr. Bob Grimesey said he certainly understood the need for additional jobs, but that it was an unusual trend.
“It used to be easier to work second jobs, but now it’s more difficult,” he said. “Teachers are held accountable for student performance. There’s a need for teachers to spend time after hours paying attention to student data and helping students. Teachers work beyond the contract more than in the past. It troubles me.”
District 4 school board member Jerry Bledsoe said he was surprised by the number of teachers working second jobs.
“I’m surprised to see 25 percent have a second job; I didn’t think it would be that high,” he said. “I know [teachers] do work at home, but now they have to juggle a second job and other responsibilities.”
Worner said more than 200 individuals reported 341 examples of how they were cutting expenses at home, including making across the board cuts and reducing their budget for basic needs like utility expenses, groceries and clothing. An additional 50 indicated ways in which they were supplementing their income other than formal employment outside the school division.
“The things [they’re giving] up aren’t luxury things,” District 2 school board member Sherrie Page said. “They’re simple things like haircuts and going to McDonalds.”
“It’s no surprise they’re feeling the impact of going on four years with no salary increases,” District 1 board member Lou Thompson added.
Worner said he was especially troubled by those that expressed concern that they were “one paycheck away from being in real trouble.”
“If the economic environment continues on the same path, second jobs and frustration will begin to impact the quality of the [education] program,” Worner said. “It’s all about the time spent on the task.”
Also troubling to the board was the response they got when employees were asked if they had applied for employment in another school division over the past year. Of the 454 who responded to the question, 105 (23 percent) indicated that they had applied to another school system since Jan. 1, 2011. Primary reasons for doing so included a desire for a higher salary, improved benefits, commuting time and opportunities for advancement and promotion.
Grimesey said it’s not surprising employees would be testing the waters in the job market with Orange County being lower in salary than surrounding counties, except for Madison.
“The reality is they could go elsewhere,” he said. “One-third of our teachers have four or less years of experience. It’s reasonable to conclude that people who have been here less time [have less ties] and would be more tempted to seek other alternatives. They’re in the position to share their very marketable skills. The pressures are no different than with other employees in a free market. We can not shame our employees into working for us.”
Grimesey said he hopes the proposed five-year plan to correct the teacher salary scale and make it more competitive will keep employees from leaving.
“I think it will send a powerful signal and [teachers] will see we’re committed to a five year plan,” he said. “This isn’t about a one year raise; this is supporting teachers over the next five years. It gives confidence to teachers while tempering the impact on the community.”
Grimesey said he hopes the community will support the plan, the first year of which is included in the budget he’ll present to the board of supervisors.
“It’s about community values and people deciding to what degree the quality of schools is worth an increase in taxes,” he said. “It’s worrisome that we’re not investing in the critical infrastructure of economic development. It’s no secret home investments are stronger in areas with stronger schools.”
“It’s not your problem,” Worner told the board. “It’s a community problem. If schools simply stay as good as they’ve been, they’re falling behind. The school system can only be as good as the community can let it be.”
Grimesey and the school board will present their budget to the board of supervisors Feb. 14.
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