Message to Employees from Superintendent of Schools
Alberto M. Carvalho
Just over 100 days ago I became Superintendent of Miami-Dade County Public Schools. What I found was a school system in financial disarray exacerbated by the worst economic conditions our state and nation have seen in nearly a century. Over the past 12 months Florida’s schools have suffered approximately $1.1 billion in budget cuts, affecting all 67 school districts in the state. Our own District has reduced its budget by close to $300 million during this time period.
These devastating economic conditions have brought us face-to-face with a very human dilemma: How can we cut costs to weather the storm — one that is causing true human suffering — while, together, charting a course to recovery and beyond?
Much of our work this school year has been spent on adjusting to chaotic financial conditions. Through it all, we have kept our eyes on our goal: to maintain a quality education for our students while safeguarding our workforce. Maintaining this delicate balance is getting harder and harder.
In his inaugural address, President Obama described the faith and determination of the American people with the quote, “…the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job…”
In hearing his words, I was reminded of a recent news report about firefighters in Yonkers, New York, who agreed to work a shift without pay, saving their city
$450,000 and restoring the jobs of their colleagues who had been laid off.
American employers and employees, both public and private, are tightening their belts across the board to get through this trying economic time in the hope that, as the economy recovers, people and programs vital to long-term success will not have been lost along the way.
We, at Miami-Dade County Public Schools have done the same, enduring prolonged uncertainties, overcoming daily challenges, and making needed sacrifices. We recognize the countless challenges you face and the sacrifices you make.
M-DCPS is a family, and, in the face of adversity, families pull together, willingly sacrificing to protect their own. Just recently, I was very touched to hear the story of a teacher at one of our elementary schools who became desperately ill and was rapidly expending her sick days. In response, her colleagues, both at the school and across the District, rallied with the personal donation of sick days in sufficient numbers to allow her to focus on her treatment and recovery -- without the added stress of worrying about how she would pay her bills and care for her children. That is courage… that is what families do.
As we weigh each budget reduction measure, we recognize our moral and fiscal obligation and redouble our commitment to never let Miami-Dade County Public Schools reenter the dangerous straits in which we found ourselves at the beginning of the school year when we had virtually no financial reserves, thus placing our District family in jeopardy.
When I was appointed Superintendent, one of the first things I did was to assemble a panel of finance experts to assess the District’s financial condition. What they found was a budget that was seriously flawed. To be frank, the 2008-2009 budget and the previous year’s budget were built on faulty assumptions and were filled with technical deficiencies, including overestimated revenues and understated expenditures.
To correct this, my administration made immediate cost-saving adjustments, and, with the wise support and authority of the School Board, we enacted the largest financial cutback in the history of this school District, saving $123 million.
These reductions included a deliberate rollback of administration with a 27 percent cut to central office expenses and administrative salaries, the elimination of 440 positions, a significant reduction in the number of employees making more than $100,000 a year, with the number of employees earning over $150,000 declining from 27 to 3, and a complete elimination of employees earning over $200,000.
Among Florida school districts, Miami-Dade County Public Schools now has the lowest administrative cost per student, up from 27th place just months ago.
We now know that we will have to reduce expenditures yet again by an additional $56 million as a result of the recent Special Legislative Session in Tallahassee.
As we’ve done to date, we will continue to make every effort to protect our workforce and the integrity of the classroom, but the cuts we have made have been deep and we cannot continue to meet this challenge without an act of collective courage from every employee. In the coming weeks you will hear details of my plan to right the course of our District, which, though painful in the short term, will lead to long term stability.
We can't fix everything immediately, but I promise every decision will be weighed against four guiding principles:
1. Protect the classroom;
2. Protect our permanent work force;
3. Maintain salaries; and finally
4. Preserve the fiscal viability of the District.
Now, some have advised me to make no promises. The times are too uncertain; the politics too treacherous. But I make these promises knowing three things: they are reasonable; they are realistic; and they are morally right.
If we can find a way to absorb cuts, maintain our permanent workforce, and maintain the integrity of the classroom, why wouldn’t we do it? If we can save art, music, physical education and bilingual education…If we can preserve the earning potential and pension contributions of our employees…If we can sustain the District’s viability for growth in the storm’s aftermath, why would we choose otherwise?
We know the way forward, to a time in the near future when we can sit together and discuss ways to best honor the hard work of our teachers, support staff, administrators — all of you who dedicate yourselves day after day to the betterment of our community, the advancement of our society and the education of our students.
We know the way to a time when the focus of our most intense discussions will not be shaped by fiscal shortfalls, rather by the quality of our instructional programs and student achievement.
But know this: Our promises can be kept only if Tallahassee halts its raid on funding for our public schools, and only if we remain united and demand that they do so.
I just returned from Tallahassee, where we continued to argue against another dollar being taken from South Florida’s public schools. Even as we learned that an additional $1 billion could be lost to K-12 education next year. Now is a time for us to hold together, to speak in a loud, clear, and unified voice: no more cuts to public education.
Some scoffed when we demanded of Washington that any plan to bail-out Wall Street, banks, and the automotive industry should also include funds to shore up America’s public schools. Now, our bold bid may be paying off with the stimulus package proposed by the President that is working its way through Congress.
However, we cannot let the voices of dissention divide us, stoking and exaggerating our differences, dividing our loyalties, obscuring our fundamental solidarity, and giving themselves cover for not doing right by our teachers and staff, our students, and our community. Not when we have so much at stake!
Nor can we morally support any proposal that benefits some, while harming others. We must stay united.
In the words of Abraham Lincoln, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
Now, it is important to acknowledge the failures of yesterday, but it is fruitless and, worse, it is counterproductive to dwell on what has been done. We must focus instead on what is yet to be done.
I ask you to suspend the disbelief that the District can act with integrity. Hold me and my team accountable for the promises we make today, and help us make them reality.
As the President recently stated in his address, and I quote… “What is required of us now, is a new era of responsibility – a recognition…that we have duties that we do not grudgingly accept, but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.”
I promise you that we are facing this difficult task head on and with the best interests of our community at heart.
We have heard the parents and students who have said don’t cut our programs… don’t cut art, don’t cut music, don’t cut secondary school reform….
And we’re Not!
We have heard the voice of the Unions as so eloquently stated by Fedrick Ingram, the Secretary/Treasurer of the UTD and one of my former students from Miami Jackson Senior High School, when he stood before the School Board and stated: “every opportunity we have to keep people employed we should exercise our talents to do so.”
I promise you, We will!
I am calling on you to stand together and, by doing so, will do what is right by Miami-Dade County Schools.
Almost 50 years ago Dr. King said that the “…arc of history bends towards justice.” We have an opportunity today to not only prove that promise true, but to stand as an example that in times of adversity we did right by all.
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