LYNWOOD — In light of declining enrollment, reductions in state funding and deficit spending that is currently being regulated by the county’s Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, school board members by a 4-1 vote on Tuesday night passed a resolution to lay off 184 certificated employees by March 15 — 101 of those being classroom teachers.

In a district newsletter released this week in response to the possible layoffs, Interim Superintendent Patrick Leier said that the district is having to do more with less.

“At this point, we have little choice but to make necessary expense reductions and work on revenue enhancement options for next year,” the newsletter stated. “In terms of budget reductions, we are working with our bargaining groups to achieve necessary expense reductions. Unfortunately, as over 90 percent of our budget is committed to personnel, we anticipate seeing significant reductions in our work force via layoff procedures.”

The final recommended list of reduction in force positions total 184. In terms of final layoff numbers, those will be finalized no sooner than March 15.

However, even those numbers are not set in stone.

“At this time we estimate 184 teacher positions to be eliminated,” the newsletter stated. “[But] … we are pursuing a conservative approach as we won’t know what our actual budget numbers will be until the state passes its budget, most likely late this summer. We are hopeful that we will be able to rescind some of the layoffs. However, we will not be able to take any action until we are able to finalize our own budget, sometime after the state adopts its budget.”

Up for elimination are one assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, one assistant superintendent of federal and state programs, six teacher/deans, one international baccalaureate program coordinator, two technology coordinators, 15 secondary school counselors, four elementary school counselors, one intervention teacher, six teachers on special assignment at the district office, 18 teachers on special assignments at school sites, 10 secondary English teachers, eight high school computer science teachers, three military science/cadet corps teachers, 13 secondary Spanish teachers, five secondary art teachers and five seventh and eighth grade science teachers.

“This really is a very sad day in Lynwood,” said Lynwood Teacher Association president Val Zolfaghari, who said he will fight to save as many of his teachers as possible. “It’s one of the saddest days in my entire career.”

The longtime teacher also talked about the more than 700 teachers the Long Beach Unified School District will be sending pink slips to come March 15.

Donald Balfour, assistant superintendent of human resources, agreed with Zolfaghari and with other members of the public who spoke during the school board meeting about the number of possible cuts in the district.

“Yes, this is a very, very sad day in Lynwood. … Having to downsize is one of the most difficult things my department has to do,” he said. “After tonight, the very difficult work of my department begins, when we will begin looking at the seniority list.”

School board President Jose Solache told the audience that the vote on the item would be very difficult for “all of us,” referring to himself and his four board colleagues.

“Last year was proof that we will try to save as many positions as possible,” Solache said. “The board knows that every position is important … and while the board will remain committed to saving as many as we can, we have to keep in mind the budget.”

School board member Alfonso Morales reminded the audience that due to estimations brought forward in prior board meetings, the board had asked staff to return to the board with the minimum number, the core number of teachers the district needs to serve students.

“But just because these positions have been deemed not to be part of the core, it doesn’t mean that they won’t be back,” Morales said about the list of 184 positions.

According to Balfour, in making staff reductions at the secondary level, the district has been operating with a four-by-two schedule, which was offering students eight-period days. That schedule has been changed to a regular six-period schedule. By cutting that, the district is saving $4 million.

Out of classroom positions have also been identified in the cuts, said Balfour. “That’s because we need as many teachers as we can in the classroom,” he said. “And for the record, each and every administrator in the district has already been notified of possible layoffs. We started there.”

Elective classes are also on the list. Those classes are on the list because the district is a program improvement district, and because the district assessment improvement team said the district was to focus its elective classes on English support, for students at the high school level who are short units. The changes in the high school graduation requirements also allowed for flexibility with the scheduling.

“That too, eliminated positions,” Balfour said.

“What we did was identify only essential classes that would not jeopardize one student from being able to graduate from high school and be able to go to a two- or four-year college,” he said. “Everything will be based on seniority. Everything. There is not going to be one teacher here who has more seniority that will be let go over the least seniority teacher.”

Non re-elect teachers will know by March 15 if they will be returning for the 2010-11 school year, Balfour said. But assignments will not be certain until the end of June, or possibly sometime in July.

Balfour said he was “warned” by the interim superintendent and by board members “to get it right this time,” referring to the seniority list.

“We were told, don’t make any mistakes,” he said. “Don’t let what happened last year, happen this year. … And that’s what we’re doing.”

Downsizing is the most heartbreaking part of his job, Balfour said. “Every one of these teachers, their livelihoods are here, they all went to college and got college degrees, they all have families, they’ve worked hard to get here, and now we’re having to release them. … But I have to say, this is the state’s problem. It’s the state who has cut our funding. We’re having to react to something the state has imposed on public schools. It’s not fair. … So we have the mandate by the state and federal government with No Child Left Behind, to meet certain goals, and yet we’re having those positions taken that provide the support these students need. So we are doing the best we can.”

Based on the cuts the district finds itself having to look at, the district is still retaining the structure required to provide that support for students.

Balfour said that had the district seen the writing on the wall about making staff cuts two years ago, when every other school district was making cuts, the district wouldn’t be where it is today. The bottom line, he said, was that board members may have been ill-informed about the seriousness of the district’s budget.

Board member Maria Lopez said she voted against the resolution because she believes the graduation requirements were changed for the wrong reasons.

“I believe we need to cut across the district by seniority, not by programs,” she said. “And there’s a lot of [classes] on that list of 184, that our kids need. … As a board member, to me, cuts need to be made by seniority level.”

Though based on the core classes students will need, the seniority is still divided into departments. For example, all English teachers will go into one list. If the district needs eight English teachers for example to meet the core requirements, then the eight with the most seniority will be saved.

“You can’t bundle all of the teachers together when it comes to certain certificated positions, because you can’t have a computer teacher teaching English or Spanish,” Balfour said. “Or an English teacher teaching a math class. There’s a difference between [elementary schools] because those teachers can teach all subjects, but it’s different when it comes to the secondary level.”