GARY | The 21st Century Charter School laid off eight people Friday including an administrator, two teachers and five teachers' aides, apparently due to budget cuts, less than two months after the fall semester began.
One of the teachers laid off said the layoffs were abrupt, and teachers had no time to say goodbye to students and gather their belongings before being told to leave the building immediately. One teacher said she did not get a layoff letter until Monday.
The teacher, who wanted to remain anonymous, said they were told the layoffs were due to budget cuts.
Kevin Teasley, president and CEO of Indianapolis-based GEO Foundation, which operates the school, said those employees were furloughed and could be rehired should enrollment increase.
"We were overstaffed," said Teasley who also acts as school superintendent.
"There were four (layoffs) at the high school and four at the elementary school," he said.
"We furloughed one administrator, one teacher and two aides at the elementary. We needed 60 pre-K students and we have 41. It wasn't enough to justify an administrator. We don't have to combine any classrooms. We have plenty of staff.
"We tried to make the cuts away from the classroom. We had too many teacher aides. We need to get more students to rehire them. If we see an increase in K-12 enrollment by the February count date, we can bring them back," Teasley said.
Added Dana Johnson Teasley, charter school coordinator, "The furloughs happened because we were overstaffed for the number of students that we had, and the positions were primarily support staff and instructional coaches. No licensed positions were lost, and no classrooms and no classroom sizes are affected in any way. Any reports that you may have received that 'eight teachers were fired' or anything along those lines are just the exaggerations of very (understandably) upset staff."
Johnson also said, "We did combine classrooms in our preschool program, and we did furlough the administrator of that program, which was really unfortunate timing, given her personal circumstances. Even though it was very high quality, and licensed by the state, the program was too small at this time to afford a full-time administrator. We are hoping it will expand next year," Dana Teasley said.
The one administrator laid off is pregnant. She was director of PreK to second grade.
Dana Teasley said 21st Century Charter School had a little more than 100 employees on staff, and eight were only furloughed, six of whom were in the main school, two were preschool. "Our students are still very well cared for," she said.
Dana Teasley said they reported the information about the layoffs to the Office of Charter School at Ball State University, which authorized the charter.
Kevin Teasley said the charter school will save half a million dollars as a result of the layoffs.
The charter school has 739 students in grades K through 12, and 41 in its preschool program.
The GEO Foundation also operates the Gary Middle College, known as GMC, which has an enrollment of a little more than 220.
GMC is a charter school geared to people who want to earn a high school diploma instead of a high school equivalency certificate. It is a sister school to 21st Century Charter School and offers anyone as young as 16 an opportunity for an education.
The principal is Joe Arredondo, who left Ivy Tech Community College to take the job this fall.