Representative Town Meeting Annual Budget Meeting Materials - Day 4 (linked)

David Campo
From: Robin Shine <rllshine@gmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, May 13, 2020 11:13 AM
To: David Campo
Subject: RTM Budget Cuts
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Mr. Campo,
It was very upsetting to hear that the RTM is considering cutting the Board of Education Budget by
$470,000. We are in the midst of a pandemic and the future is very uncertain in terms of adjustments that will
need to be made once we start back to school in August. There are many things to consider. For instance, we
may need more busses, PPE, more devices for distance learning, and additional software for students to
continue their distance learning. This is all vital to ensure success for our students. A cut of $470K means
programs and teachers will be affected resulting in negative outcomes for both our students and the district.
| am a Waterford resident of 32 years and a teacher/technology coach in the district. | am working tirelessly to
support our distance learning program to ensure success for our staff and students. Other districts that do not
have “coaches” have been struggling with distance learning because they don’t have the supports in place like
Waterford. With the proposed cuts, these efforts will affect our programs and could possibly affect our
successful distance learning model that we have worked and continue to work so diligently on. We have been
very successful in launching a distance learning program for our students because of all the support we have
in our district. Our IT department has given out hundreds of devices to students and we are running very low
on inventory. If this pandemic continues, we will need more money to support our distance-learning efforts.
Currently, students are struggling with a variety of devices that are not always compatible with all the software
we use in the district. This leads to excessive hours of troubleshooting to support students and teachers,
which in turn takes away from precious academic time. It has become very apparent during this time that the
district should consider going 1:1 with devices for all students in the district. With that said, the cut in the
budget will not be able to support such efforts. Instead, we should be receiving additional monies to support
the teachers and students in the district. Cutting the budget will be detrimental to student and district growth
and | highly advise against it.
Sincerely, es
Robin Shine , &
Teacher/Technology Coach . . ' faa
Waterford Public Schools : oad
S20hY Al