Summer vacation is over for thousands of students in the Antelope Valley. The 2010-11 school year began August 9 for half of the Antelope Valley’s 12 school districts: Antelope Valley Union High School, Eastside Union, Keppel Union, Southern Kern Unified, Westside Union, and Wilsona. Earlier this week, classes started for the Murac Joint Unified School District, Hughes-Elizabeth Lakes Union Elementary, and Mojave unified school districts.

The 2010-11 school year follows year where which many school districts’ governing boards were forced to make drastic spending cuts to remain solvent, and school officials hope that this will not be the case once more, and say higher student enrollment would improve the situation for some districts.
 
Regina Rossall, superintendent for the Westside Union School District, said recently the district’s student registration is 400 students behind last year’s pace, and that represents a potential loss of $5,000 per student. “Usually, this is our big push week and we’re not getting the big numbers that we’ve had in the past,” Rossall said.

The Antelope Valley Union High School District made professional development days voluntary last week for teachers to compensate for unpaid work days the district implemented last as a cost-saving measure.

“It’s been a good first week,” Superintendent David Vierra said. “Students and staff are excited to return. There is high energy and lots of participation.”

Eastside Union School District Superintendent Roberto Villa said school officials are ready for the start of school. “Teachers returned to work to clean classrooms,” Villa said. “Their computers have been tested and re-tested to make sure they are ready to go. Supplies, including workbooks, textbooks, pencils and paper, have been delivered.

“In visiting some of the sites, I observed lots of enthusiasm, energy and a readiness to really pick up where they left off with our students,” Villa said. “Principals and assistant principals are exuberant with enthusiasm fueled by solid achievement results. My message to my administrative team continues to be that enthusiasm is a vital element toward the individual success of every one of our teachers, staff, and students.”

SOAR High School Principal Michael Dutton, who also serves as a member on Keppel Union School District’s board of trustees, expressed optimism about the new school year. “Our enrollment is up 300. Of course, our total student enrollment cannot exceed 400. We want to keep the school small, (because) that makes for smaller classrooms and a better learning environment for the students and teaching environment for the instructors.

“This is exciting,” Dutton continued. “I get this sense of excitement about education and what’s happening. We have a brand new academy in Keppel we’re kicking off, we’ve got school-wide technology here at SOAR that we’re kicking off. It’s going to be a great year.”

The Lancaster School District, which began school in August last year, switched to a traditional calendar for this year, after working on a year-round schedule because of overcrowding. School will begin September 8 at the district’s 19 campuses.

Lancaster was forced to cut approximately $11.3 million for 2010-11, and expects to have projected expenses of $108 million.
The savings came through six furlough days for employees and shutting down all schools and the district office in the month of July. That saved roughly $3.5 million in personnel costs.
“We spent a lot of money on utilities,” said Mick McClatchey, assistant superintendent of business services in reference to the district’s old year-round schedule.