School districts across the nation are asking for more COVID-19 relief to help avoid budget cuts. | Pixabay
School districts throughout Texas are preparing for possible budget cuts due to a decline in revenue as a result of COVID-19.
Texas school district leaders were part of an effort by more than 60 urban districts in the nation to send a letter to Congress, according to Go San Angelo. In the letter, district leaders were asking for additional economic relief to cover pandemic-related costs and to avoid potential budget cuts.
“These budget cuts will mean teaching staff will be laid off, class sizes will balloon and remaining teaching staff will likely be redeployed into classes and subjects that they may not be used to teaching,” the letter states. “All at a time when they will be asked to address unprecedented unfinished learning from the last school year.”
Districts are already cutting back on discretionary spending, holding off on hiring new employees and considering freezing teacher salaries.
“More potential cost savings now can inhibit reduced layoffs later,” Marguerite Roza, director of Georgetown University-based research center Edunomics Lab, told Go San Angelo.
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