February 2010

Page 1

PASO ROBLES HIGH SCHOOL

Presorted Standard

Non-Profit Org U.S. Postage

PAID

Permit #56

Paso Robles, CA

VOLUME 69

2.10. 2010 ISSUE 4

>> CRIMSONCHRONICLE.COM

801 NIBLICK RD. PASO ROBLES, CALIFORNIA

BUDGET CUT BLUES: Assistant Superintendent of Personnel Greig Welch (Left), Assistant Superintendent of Business Gary Hoskins and Superintendent Dr. Kathy McNamara ((Right) g ) discussed the new budget g with somber looks Tues. Jan. 26. Photo by Lindsay Reed.

Budget cuts set to devastate PRHS

by Karlee Anderson, Editor-in-Chief with contributions from Aryn Fields, A&E Editor, C.J. Prusi, People Co-Editor, Caitlyn Curran, Fun and Games Editor and Monica Patel, Managing Editor Teachers were on edge, custodians less chipper and coaches nearly disgruntled on Jan. 6, when Paso Robles Joint Unified School District (PRJUSD) announced a proposed plan to cut programs in the 20092010 Fiscal Solvency Program. Schools in the PRJUSD are primarily funded by attendance and with declining enrollment, funding will be even lower in the 20102011 school year. With a shortfall of $2.4 million from the 2009-2010 budget, interfund borrowing of $4.8 million, and an estimated shortfall of $2.6 million this year, in the next 18 months, PRJUSD will need to eliminate a minimum of $7.4 million from its budget. Cuts may not wait until next school year in the fall. Final decisions on cuts will be made May of this year. The primary reason for the Fiscal Solvency Plan is so PRJUSD will not start out the next school year (2010-2011) in a negative budget status. “The school district relies primarily on revenue to operate from the State. That revenue has gone down the last two years, and it is anticipated that it will go down next year. There is some local revenue and that will go down next year as well. Th is year’s budget was helped with the Federal Stimulus funds which will not be available next year,” Assistant Superintendent of Business Gary Hoskins said. Last year May 12- Aug. 11, meetings regarding the budget and the current board approved budget reductions resulted in cuts and categorical sweeps (moving funds from one account to another), saving a total of $2.30 million.

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Although this is only a preliminary list of cuts, PRJUSD faces regulations from the state and requirements to meet before the state will intervene with PRJUSD. “If these cuts aren’t made then the district won’t be able to meet its fi nancial responsibilities at some point next year. We’ll run out of money. And that causes a lot of problems because you would have some people that might not get paid. We might have to stop some things that might be going on during the school year that we’ll have to stop in the middle of the school year. And also the school district could get a negative declaration which means that they can’t make their bills, the state intervenes and starts taking over,” Hoskins said. With the proposed budget cuts comes a sense of uncertainty from the PRHS staff . “The dramatic effect of the proposed budget cuts on PRHS is very disconcerting to me; it should be to everyone. At this point I don’t know which of the proposed reductions will be approved by the School Board. While the governor has stated he doesn’t want to further reduce funding to education, the fact is that Paso Robles School District has incurred significant budget reductions from the State. By law, the district must be able to show it can afford all the costs it incurs and as of now, it cannot,” Principal Randy Nelson said. With cuts and programs being terminated, PRHS art teacher Josh Gwiazda feels the pressure. “My question is when will the School Board and the District Administration begin to share the burden of our difficult economic situation? If they continue to cut into the classroom eliminating student

Proposed Budget Cuts

services, teachers, librarians Over two dozen PRJUSD employees and custodial staff, there will will be laid off (teachers, janitors, be nothing left to adminiscounselors, etc.) trate,” Gwiazda said. Coaches and extra-curricular Both Hoskins and Assisactivity teachers will no longer receive stipends tant Superintendent of Personnel Greig Welch admit to Teacher pay will be the ambiguity of the fi nancial eliminated by 1 percent future. “The fi nal decisions of what Sports transportation will be limited especially for larger gets cut haven’t been made teams (football and track) yet. The list is a proposal; it was put together taking sugElimination of summer gestions from a lot of differschool ent people that were willing to make suggestions. And so that list still needs further discussion and the fi nal cuts will be made by the board. The fi nal cuts probably will not actually be voted one until the end of May or the fi rst of June,” Hoskins said. “We hope [the list of cuts] won’t be all passed, we made up a document of worst case scenario. We are thinking to take a litt le bit out of each proposed part, but these are all possible cuts. We don’t know what will be the fi nal cuts though,” Welch said. Welch also said that although there is some vagueness, there are certain things that can be expected to happen.

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See ‘BUDGET’ News Page 3

Evelyn Lopez isn’t “missing anything”

by Caitlyn Curran, Fun and Games Editor and Ana Tores, Reporter Junior Evelyn Lopez enjoys Mexican music, hip-hop, and loves dancing. Seeing her walk the halls, one wouldn’t know why her alarm clock vibrates with flashing lights to wake her up for school. Lopez is deaf and, more importantly, comfortable with herself. “I don’t feel like I’m missing anything,” Lopez said quietly while signing simultaneously. She can go to the movies with her friends, her favorite is “Freedom Writers.” She can feel the noise in the theatre, its loud. She can understand the movie as it progresses on the huge screen. Her friends start to laugh, she looks around and laughs too. Rather than hearing clarity in a noise, she can feel it and even recognize it with people she knows. She learned to lip read and speak in kin-

dergarten, but these modes of communication are foreign to her. Her cultural language is American Sign Language. American Sign Language (ASL) changed Lopez’s personal and academic life. Her fi rst exposure to ASL was at Camp Hapitok when she was in fi rst grade. It opened her eyes to a way to communicate, something that comes naturally to most of us. “[Before ASL] I never talked; I would just cover my head and stay quiet,”Lopez said. In retrospect, without ASL, Lopez would have never been able to communicate with her older sister who went deaf two months ago. Lopez and her sister are part of the 90 percent of deaf children who are born to hearing parents.

“Now that I’m in high school it’s like I’ve come out of my shell,” Lopez said. She can att ribute this in part to sign language and her interpreter, Estella Webb. Webb’s son was born deaf and she decided to learn sign language, leading her to a job as an interpreter. Lopez stated that having Webb as an interpreter changed her life for the better. Lopez keeps her eyes on Webb as she translates the teacher’s lesson into ASL. Th is has helped Evelyn’s education tremendously, but Lopez has bigger dreams. She lit up as she signed her excitement about transferring to Fremont School for the Deaf, a residential school in See ‘LOPEZ’ People Page 12

Blind Date bocce ball bonanza

Artist of the month: Alison Hutchinson

Guess whose ‘STACHE this is!

Wrestling with appetites

>> People page 8

>> A& E page 15

>> Fun and Games page 18

>> Sports page19


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