Eugene School District 4J

The district has not sought furlough days as a proposed solution to the budget reductions with any of the employee groups. Furlough days are typically considered when there is a short-term budget constraint. This occurred during the 2008 recession in 4J and other districts in Oregon. The current situation in 4J is not a short-term budget shortfall: 4J is at its lowest enrollment in 25 years and at its highest staffing level ever. The budget can only become balanced when expenditures on staffing match revenue. Revenue is based on the number of students being served. It would be unfair to reduce the work year and compensation for all employees on a permanent basis and likely would not allow the district to meet state requirements for instructional time.

Eugene School District 4J staffing levels by employee group, 2000-25. (Open in new tab or window, or download/open in image viewer, to see the image at full size.)

Since 2018-19, 4J has added 57 MAPS FTE, 233 licensed FTE and 165 classified FTE.

4J has 34 licensed "administrators" who are not principals. That includes 20 administrators, six directors, five executives, two professionals and one manager.

Actual class sizes are determined when students arrive in the fall, but the proposed budget for 2025-26 projects four schools with one grade level (4th or 5th only) with an average class size of between 28-29 students. The projected elementary average district-wide is 21.74; the projected average for 4th grade is 23.19, and 23.79 for 5th grade. The district does adjust class sizes annually. The classes that are projected to be above 27 students will be looked at closely for the possibility for fit-it funding in the fall.

In the lawsuit, the district is represented by attorneys from Democracy Now on a pro bono basis - at no cost to the district. To date, the only staff that have spent time in the preparation of materials, declarations and other matters are the interim superintendent and the district’s general counsel. Future time investment is likely to be limited to those same two positions. Eugene School District 4J has joined the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and two other partners to stop the U.S. Department of Education from threats to withhold federal funding based on undefined prohibitions of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. Programs that the district believes are required to benefit all students and align with Oregon law. The loss of federal funds would have a devastating impact on the District’s programs serving some of our most vulnerable populations - students with disabilities, economically disadvantaged students, English learners, migrant families and more - including the free school meals that might be the only meals of the day for some students. In preventing damaging losses from federal funding, the modest time investment on the suit is a sound investment.

The catering initiative is a long-term strategy to generate sustainable revenue that supports core nutrition services. Rising food and labor costs continue to strain federal reimbursement models. A district-run catering program allows us to diversify income, reinvest in school meal quality, and showcase the skill of our culinary team. Most districts rely on a la carte sales to raise supplemental funds—but because we are committed to universal meals without point-of-sale transactions, that’s not a viable path for us. Catering fills this gap. It also allows us to redirect district catering expenditures internally. Rather than outsourcing food for meetings or events, departments can work with Nutrition Services—keeping dollars within the public system, supporting our staff, and expanding student Career & Technical Education (CTE) experiences. This program is funded through restricted grants and one-time funds, and staffing is phased and separate from daily school kitchen operations. Our school kitchen staffing is the strongest it has been since 2015.

If the district adopts the proposed 2025-26 budget with net reductions of about $19 million, the district is still anticipated to overspend it’s revenue by almost $23 million and we will spend through almost all of our General Fund reserves. This would mean that as we plan for the 2026-27 year, reductions of at least $22 million will be needed just to meet our reserve requirements. In the future, the vast majority of the reductions will need to come from staff, as non-staff and one-time options are already being reduced this year. As the Budget Committee and Board discuss additional options to the proposed budget, making decisions of less reductions for the 2025-26 may ultimately lead to larger cuts in future years. Just the same if the Budget Committee and Board decide to make additional reductions on top of the proposed budget, this allows more funding for future years.

The total of $228.4 million does not equal what is shown in the budget document for General Fund Salaries and Associated Payroll Costs. There is a difference of just over $12 Million, which accounts for coaches, extended contracts, stipends and other miscellaneous payments to employees that are budgeted.

General fund staffing costs for the 2025-26 budget total 90.6 cents of every dollar of the overall general fund income at the district.

• Classified: 25.7 cents, 28.4%
• Licensed: 51.9 cents, 57.3%
• MAPS/Admin 13.0 cents, 14.3%

Insurance, Oregon Public Employees Retirement System (PERS), workers compensation, unemployment, Social Security, professional development, and 403b retirement account (tax-sheltered annuity).

All cash that the district has on hand is held in the State Government Investment Pool as well as outside investment accounts that are mainly bond-related ranging from 1-5 year investments. The district does hold cash on hand for transactions such as Accounts Payable, Payroll, and other payments that are made on a regular basis within our regular bank accounts. Our interest rates range for the Local Government Investment Pool adjust regularly and have ranged this year from 3.5% up to 4.6%. Our outside investments have a variety of rates depending on what type and how long that investment is. These ranges can be from more short term which can receive ranges of 3-4% up to 5 years which typically receive higher interest rates of 4-5%.

The district adopts curriculum on a cycle mandated by the state. New curriculum has been adopted and teachers need an opportunity to learn about the new curriculum before implementing it in classrooms. Staff have  limited time w at the beginning of the year and during the year, with many competing priorities. Setting up our teachers for success with the new curriculum is imperative if we want our adopted material to have an impact on student learning.

Two reasons: 1) These reductions are likely. The district wanted to provide potentially impacted staff notice as early as possible so that they can have time to consider all options through the spring and summer. 2) Fairness and compassion. If the district had waited until the decision was final, impacted staff, employee groups, co-workers, families, and community members would not have had an opportunity to share concerns and alternative ideas with the Budget Committee and School Board before they made a final decision. And, impacted staff may have learned of the decision in a public meeting or in the news, rather than from a supervisor they work with regularly.

Almost 80% of the total proposed cuts are outside of the classroom: 55.4% from non-classroom materials and services, and not staffing at all; 22.3% are non-classroom staff and 22.2% are classroom personnel. 

Every position, program, and resource in our district plays a vital role in supporting students. Running a modern, large school district requires many staff members performing important jobs that don’t directly teach students. 

Teaching and learning happens in buildings that need to be clean, safe and maintained. Students need healthy meals and safe transportation. Employees need to be hired, paid and insured, and the district needs to meet hundreds of standards and expectations, legal or practical, from federal, state and local levels. Even in the category of licensed staff alone, people play important roles for new teacher mentoring, professional development, curriculum adoptions, academic planning and other areas that allow classroom teachers to do what they do well and support the whole operation. 

Our school sites have provided the position reduction proposals, determining the specific breakdown of a total number of hours needed, supplied by the district. Staff reductions are not final until the School Board adopts a budget (expected May 21)

The increase in the general fund reserves amount, based on current budgets, went from about $11 million to about $18 million.

Equity, Inclusion and Belonging is cutting a total of 1.5 FTE in licensed and classified staffing.

The proposed staffing reductions are roughly proportional across all employee groups, including managers, administrators, professionals and supervisors. The district’s proposed budget has personnel staffing reductions of 65.80 FTE (full-time equivalent) positions:

• Licensed — 46.0 of 1,104 total FTE, or 4.2% of this year’s general fund licensed staff (licensed make up about 49% of all 4J employees)
• Classified —12.8 of 986 total FTE, or 1.3% of this year’s general fund classified staff (classified make up about 44% of all 4J employees)
• MAPS/unrepresented — 7.0 of 177 total FTE, or 4.0% of this year’s of general fund MAPS/unrepresented staff (MAPS/unrepresented make up about 8% of all 4J employees)

"Administrators" in 4J usually refers to staff members who are not part of the licensed or classified groups: managers, administrators, professionals and supervisors (MAPS) and the unrepresented employees including directors and executives. There are 177 of these positions (55 principals, 28 instructional, 69 operational and 25 unrepresented), making up 8% of 4J’s employees.

The “reserves” consist of several separate accounts, including contingency, unappropriated funds, and rollover funds from the previous year. In the current 2024-25 budget, the district initially had about $75 million in reserves. The district budgeted to spend about $29 million of that for this current year. In the proposed 2025-26 budget, the district will be spending an additional $23 million of the reserves. This will leave an estimated $23 million left in reserves going into the 2026-27 year. School board policy requires reserves of at least 8% of the general fund budget, or about $21 million.

We build the elementary staffing on class size maximums, doing our best to avoid blended grade classrooms when possible, and using the needs index when applying the class size maximums by school. Our needs index is a composite index that sums up a school's demographic population considering Community Eligibility Provision (formerly known as Free and Reduced Lunch eligibility), Special Education identification, English Language Learner identification, and Student Mobility. Except in a few cases, schools were provided enough classroom staffing to have single grade classes. As a general guideline we targeted class size of no more than 25 students in K, no more than 26/27 in first grade, no more than 28/29 in second grade and no more than 30 in all other grades. Other resources (which may or may not include FTE) are also allocated to buildings based on enrollment and other factors, including factors related to the needs index. Funding for those other resources come from a variety of sources and can be dependent on state formulas, funding availability and other factors that vary year to year.

Secondary staffing is based on the total number of students enrolled or projected and the number of students per grade level. As a general guideline, we try to keep core subject class sizes to approximately 27:1 in middle school and 30:1 in high school. As with elementary, the needs index is used when looking at class sizes and/or allocation of resources. Other resources are allocated to our secondary schools in the same manner as our elementary and vary year to year and by school.

Some schools receive additional funding through Title and other programs that other schools may not. Not all licensed FTE are classroom teachers. Some buildings have been staffed at higher rates in recent years supported by federal pandemic relief funding that is no longer available, and the district (after maintaining staffing using reserves) must now align spending with current enrollment and revenue.

Title I funds provide additional support to schools serving high percentages of students from low-income backgrounds. Allocations are determined on a per-student basis, using eligibility data from the Community Eligibility Provision (formerly known as Free and Reduced Lunch eligibility):

• 60% or more eligible → $1,450 per student
• 50%–59.99% eligible → $1,375 per student
• 35%–49.99% eligible → $1,275 per student

While the Oregon Department of Education recommends funding schools with poverty rates of 40% or higher, our district has chosen to include schools at 35% and above. Schools below the 35% threshold did not qualify for Title I funds under our current model. If your school qualifies for Title I funding, the distribution will be divided up for each building qualified based on the above allocation. 

Third grade reading is absolutely a priority in the district, along with high school graduation, high school completion, student attendance, and student mental health, etc., and all of the other initiatives that were prioritized at that time. We are continuing to support students being proficient readers by third grade through our new curriculum adoption and implementation. We have added instructional coaches to each elementary school that support the improvement of classroom reading instruction for each classroom. We are also piloting high-dosage tutoring in our highest-needs elementary schools. The funding from the Oregon Department of Education has not increased at a rate that matches the staffing cost increases over time. We initially funded each section of first grade with three hours of educational assistant time. In recent years this was reduced to two hours per classroom. This year we were unable to maintain this level of support for our first grade classrooms.

This year, the district is spending almost $30 million more than its revenue and is using reserves to balance the budget. The current proposed budget (as of April 4, 2025) uses about $23 million more in reserves to help fill the revenue gap that has continued to grow. This use of reserves can't continue indefinitely. The reserves would be emptied after another year and, without further reductions, the district would still have spending above its shrinking revenue. Board policy requires reserves of at least 8 percent of the budget. Over the next few years 4J must align its spending with its declining enrollment and revenue

Since 2021-22 the district increased staffing 37 percent, enabled by one-time federal pandemic relief funds. Those funds are expended and can't be renewed. District enrollment has continued to decline, which means less ongoing money from the state which makes up the bulk of 4J's revenue.  

Birth rates in our region have been slowly declining, entering kindergarten classes have been smaller than exiting senior classes. Also, high housing costs and low availability make it challenging for young families to move into 4J’s boundaries. 

District reserves grew in previous years when federal pandemic relief funds were available, and other district spending was less than projected while other incoming revenue was higher. 

The district is using almost $30 million in reserves this year and has proposed using around $23 million in 2025-26; that spending rate can't continue and reserves would run out. Like a savings account at home, once reserves are spent, they are gone unless you find a way to to save more money to replenish them. A sound budget means spending within the amount coming in, while keeping some savings for emergencies. Reserves, or contingency, is more important than ever with uncertainty about the future of federal funding. If some funds don't arrive as expected the district will need those "savings" to pay its bills. 

Of the cuts in the April 4 proposed budget, 80 percent are outside the classroom. 

The district listed the Wells Fargo building for sale in June 2024. Proceeds from a sale could offset future budget cuts. 

It doesn't. The six executive jobs in 4J include a chief of staff, a chief of operations, and assistant superintendents for instruction and access; student support services and well-being; equity, inclusion and belonging; and administrative services. These six employees oversee the district's core functions, and the positions have existed in various titles in 4J for more than 25 years. Compared to other districts in Oregon of similar enrollment (within 3,000 students), one has 10 executives, two have nine and one has seven.