The Paso Robles Joint Unified School District is once again talking about job cuts. This time, it could be teachers and counselors. The potential cuts were up for discussion at the latest board meeting.
Assistant Superintendent of Business Services, Brad Pawlowski, explained that the district is dealing with a $3.9 million budget deficit.
If you think about a structural deficit, thats where there is chronic budget imbalance, where you have reoccurring expenditures that exceed the revenue,” Pawlowski said. “Thats what weve had for multiple years.”
The districts goal for the 2026-27 school year is to reduce $2,750,000 in expenses.
Superintendent Jennifer Loftus said declining enrollment, plus the loss of COVID-19 funding, is driving the proposal.
The way schools are funded in California, enrollment directly impacts your funding. If students are not enrolled and at school, you have less funding, Loftus said.
The list of potential job cuts includes five elementary school teachers, one high school counselor at Paso Robles High School, and a number of paraeducators. Some students and staff spoke out against the cuts.
Counselors are always kind to kids and help them feel safe,” one child said. “If they are gone, I think it will be harder for kids and teachers.”
Some disagree about the reasoning behind the funding cuts.
We ask you to question this and to please maintain student-facing positions in the district and instead reduce spending elsewhere from non-student-facing positions and other expenditures,” one speaker said.
Others said these cuts could have an impact on marginalized students, particularly students whose first language is not English.
Superintendent Loftus said she wants parents to know there will still be resources available for their children.
Our priority has been to keep the cuts as far away from the classroom as possible. In this design, where there was a possible reduction of counselors, each school site still has a school psychologist,” Loftus said. “In fact, all of our elementary sites have a full-time school psychologist. At the junior high and high school level, there are multiple school counselors.
The Paso Robles Joint Unified School Board is expected to revisit this topic on March 10.