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School districts seek ways to save money

JANESVILLE — Some day, teachers from different Rock County school districts could sit side-by-side at the same training sessions.

That's one idea floated Thursday as school board presidents from a number of districts met in Janesville to discuss ways to save money.

Superintendents joined the presidents for the meeting, as did Rock County Administrator Craig Knutson.

Other ideas floated at the meeting, with no commitments to follow through, included:

-- Districts could synchronize their calendars in order to allow common professional development sessions for staffs.

-- Students in Janesville might learn Japanese from teachers in the Beloit Turner district, via the state's BadgerNet telecommunications network. Some local districts use BadgerNet extensively, but Janesville uses it very little.

-- Districts could agree to common goals as they bargain with their unions.

-- Districts could join forces to set up schools for at-risk students, for talented students or schools for performing arts that they could not afford to support on their own.

-- Districts could share staff members with expertise in different areas. For example, Janesville's successful grant writers could include other districts to set up cooperative, grant-funded programs.

Despite the differences in their organizations, the officials seemed united in one common problem: Difficulties meeting state mandates with the level of government funding they're getting.

"Our budget's pretty skinny as it is, so we're nervous—if it's going to be cut again, where's it going to come from?" asked Parkview co-superintendent Steve Lutzke.

Knutson said Gov. Jim Doyle's proposed budget for county human services is cutting back so far that Rock County would get the same dollars next year as it got in the early 1990s.

And that might mean that juvenile-related services the county provides to school districts might not be the same in the future, Knutson said.

Janesville School Board President DuWayne Severson said he hoped to get the local state legislative delegation to come to the presidents' next meeting to respond to a list of things that state government could do for the schools.

No date was set, but Severson said he wanted it to happen in about a month.