Marysville students warned of 'standing room only' classes

Marysville School District warns of 'standing room only' at some schools

With only three days to go before the start of the school year, the Marysville School District if figuring out how they'll make up for millions of dollars in a budget deficit.

MARYSVILLE, Wash. - With only three days to go before the start of the school year, the Marysville School District is revealing more about how it will make up for millions of dollars in budget shortfalls.

Despite deep cuts over the past two years, the superintendent announced the district would have to cut another 6 million or more, with some of those additional cuts discussed Monday.

The budget cuts come on the heels of what the state auditor said was the most alarming audit of a public school's finances in 17 years.

Marysville School District Superintendent Zachary Robbins also warned that class sizes may be larger in general.

The Executive Director of Secondary Education said on Monday there is the possibility there could be standing room only in some high school and secondary classrooms for the first few days until the counselors sort things out.

The potential for large class sizes, especially at the secondary level, was a hot button issue at Monday's board meeting.

"Let’s be realistic. Its huge class sizes, unsafe, unsafe for science classes with what you are talking about doing," said Christine, a former district staff member.

Superintendent Zacary Robbins put out this post ahead of the meeting.

"This year we may start the year with some class sizes that are larger than desired, not outrageously large, but larger than desired," said Robbins.

"There could be some kids standing the first couple of days, trying to see if they are in there, the pressure on the administration, the counselors and the registers is going to be huge for those first five days, it’s not a fun way to start a building," said Voni Walker, Executive Director Secondary Education, pictured below.

As for staffing, Walker said there are eight open positions, and with the possibility of larger class sizes, they will need to fill them quickly.

The district cut $12 million for the 2023-2024 school year, nearly $13.5 million the year before that, and had to cut another $6 million this year.

To make up for the shortfall, Superintendent Robbins announced a hiring freeze for non-essential positions and a restriction on credit card spending, which the Marysville Coalition says is interesting given recent reports.

"The superintendent’s discretionary fund has been over spent by $102,000 this year," said J. Hooman, Marysville Community Coalition founder.

As for the budget cuts, this was a list of planned reductions presented to the school board on Monday night;

District Office/Administration will drop by - $0.7 M
District Office/Classified - $0.8 M
Instructional Support - $0.6 M
School Administration - $0.6 M
Schools/Classified Support - $0.1 M
Student Services - $1.0 M
Supplies and Materials - $0.4 M
Teaching - $4.9 M
Total Reductions of - $7.8 M

This is the general fund budget projection presented at the Monday night meeting.

"Yes, we are in enhanced binding conditions with the enhanced finance oversight committee, but we are a school district that is struggling financially in Washington state like many others from an under funded public school system," said Eliza Davis, Marysville School Board Director.

Brandon Bowman, Director of Finance and Operations, says that the budget cuts will get the district closer to OSPI guidelines.

He said Monday that expenditures went up due to insurance, which prompted another shift in how much had to be cut over the last few days.

"We are just in a really hard position in Marysville school district, and we are all just trying to do our best to make sure that our students are educated, and our district keeps moving forward," said Davis.