AP News 

DORIE TURNER
Associated Press Writer

 
 
ATLANTA — School districts across Georgia are scrambling as they face the bleak prospect of furloughing teachers to cover state budget cuts announced this week.

 

Officials in Gwinnett County, the state's largest school district with 150,000 students, say they have no choice but to give educators and other employees three unpaid days to cover an expected $12 million cut in state funding for worker salaries. But Cobb County, the second-largest district with 100,000 students, is dipping into reserve funds instead, and Marietta City Schools say they probably won't have to furlough teachers because of layoffs this past year.

 

Other districts are telling teachers to stay home rather than come in for planning days scheduled for coming weeks. And some are still trying to decide how to cope with losing millions from budgets.

 

"Everything is on the table," said Louis Svehla, spokesman for the 32,000-student Richmond County schools in east Georgia. "Certainly, we want to do the best we can to not have to have layoffs or furloughs because those things all affect student achievement."

 

Gov. Sonny Perdue announced Tuesday more widespread cuts to state agencies and departments to fill a $900 million shortfall amid plummeting tax collections.

 

The $191 million in cuts to schools are on top of the $241 million already sliced from the state's education budget this fiscal year and the $430 million taken from schools last fiscal year, which ended June 30. The damage would have been worse without help from federal economic stimulus funding.

 

The Cobb County school board voted Thursday night to use $10 million of the district's $102 million rainy day fund to avoid furloughs. Superintendent Fred Sanderson was not available for comment Friday.

 

But for some districts, like Hall County schools in northeast Georgia and Gwinnett County in metro Atlanta, there was nothing left to cut. That left furloughs as the only option.

 

"The loss of these valuable days for teachers is not an insignificant matter, but with few options, this was the most workable solution," Gwinnett County schools superintendent J. Alvin Wilbanks said in a news release.

Most districts that are furloughing teachers are asking them to take their unpaid leave during planning days when students aren't attending school.

 

Educator groups have criticized the cuts as shortsighted as the state struggles to improve test scores and graduation rates, both of which rank among the last in the nation.

 

"This couldn't come at a worse time. Kids are excited about new clothes and new teachers and classes. Teachers are getting their rooms ready," said Tim Callahan, spokesman for the Professional Association of Georgia Educator. "You're going to have teachers feeling pretty grim about things coming back to schools, students who are concerned how it's going to impact them and parents who are on the sidelines watching it all."

 

But Perdue said during his Tuesday news conference that with lagging income tax collections, paltry revenue collections have given him few other choices.

 

"We've got to live in the reality of the moment," he said. "These steps are necessary and prudent to make sure we keep our promises to the taxpayers of Georgia."

 

The state Board of Education has called a meeting for next week to adopt measures that would pave the way for school districts to furlough teachers and other employees.

 

The board will meet Tuesday at 8 a.m. to consider waivers to the number of days the state requires each school district employee to work.