Monroe County schools to consolidate Aurora Alternative as part of $4.5M budget cut

Parents, students and alumni of Aurora Alternative High School stood in a circle around principal Chuck Holloway after the school board confirmed that their school would close.

“We have until they change the locks on the building,” Holloway said. “We’ve got people we don’t know we have. ... We worked our butts off for a week. Take the weekend to relax, and we’ll come back together Monday.”

Holloway received the news at 2:30 p.m. Feb. 12 that the consolidation of Aurora, a school of choice for 80 academically at-risk students, was recommended to help offset the Monroe County Community School Corporation $4.5 million in budget cuts.

Feb. 12 was a Friday, and Holloway’s students had already left for the weekend, many going home without knowing their school would be consolidated.

Students met at Aurora the next day to plan a strategy to save their school. A Facebook group was started called “HELP SAVE Aurora Alternative High School!” After a day, it had nine members. Now it has about 300.

Although their classes had been canceled, students gathered last Monday at the courthouse with posters in hand to rally for their school.

Students also attended about four-hour school board meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday to speak their minds about why their school should stay open. They organized another rally on Thursday before the decision was made Friday.

When the snow had melted and classes resumed Wednesday, Aurora had a record low attendance with 24 students missing. Holloway said he couldn’t tell how much of the attendance was because of weather and how much of it was because students didn’t want to come to school after hearing the news about the possible consolidation.

“As significant as any, the reason students come to Aurora is that they felt that they don’t matter,” Holloway said to the school board on Tuesday night. “Please don’t send that message to these kids that they don’t matter.”

Fighting for the school
Jessica Barger came to Aurora three years ago as a sophomore, but the school didn’t work for her. She ended up dropping out and having a child. When she saw her best friend graduate as Aurora’s 2009 valedictorian, she knew she had to go back. Now she’s a junior and plans to graduate.

“Never in my life have I felt so welcome in such a small community,” she said to the school board Tuesday.

Senior Lindsey Smith said she came to Aurora simply to get her parents off her back. She was technically a junior at the time, but she only had nine credits. Although she’s now a senior, she doesn’t have enough credits to graduate, and she’ll need to come back to Aurora.

“Before I came to Aurora I knew for a fact that I was a future high school dropout,” she said Tuesday.

Social studies teacher Tim Fick stood up at Tuesday’s school board meeting and invited attendees to the Buskirk-Chumley Theater on May 28 for Aurora’s 15th graduation ceremony.

“I’ve always told our kids that the community values them,” Fick said at the meeting. “The other kids get their own football field and pool. Our kids get their own school. Please don’t take that away from them.”

Many alumni also spoke at the school board meeting, including 2005 Aurora graduate Heather Boltinghouse. She received all Fs except one D her first semester as a freshman at Bloomington High School North. When she switched to Aurora, she was on honor roll. Although it took her several years after graduation to enroll in college, she says Chuck pushed her, and she’s currently enrolled at Ivy Tech Community College.

“Would I walk back into North? No, I’d run the other way,” she said.

Aurora students are not the only ones being affected. There are changes being made throughout the corporation to offset the budget cuts. For instance, it was approved that media specialists will be reduced, Batchelor Middle School’s pool will close, middle school foreign language teachers will be reduced, the Elementary Strings program will no longer exist and the list goes on.

“This is not an isolated problem, and it is happening to almost all school districts in the state and the country,” MCCSC superintendent J.T. Coopman said. “And this is where I get emotional. I hate it for public schools and the children we serve. I fear that public education will never be the same again. I also think this won’t be the end.”

The cuts come from reductions in state funds, and the board stressed that they see more budget cuts to come in the next few years. The board encouraged people to send letters to Gov. Mitch Daniels.

“I want you all to know I know it’s bad,” said school board secretary Vicki Streiff. “I don’t think there’s a way to cut $4.5 million out of our budget without damaging our school district. I don’t think we’re doing good things. I think we’re doing terrible things because we’re stuck.”

They still have hope
During the 15 years since Holloway founded Aurora, about 300 students have received their diplomas.

By closing Aurora, the school corporation will save about $300,000. In about two days, Holloway and a few other teachers put together a four-step proposal that was submitted to the school board.

“Basically, we need to come up with $300,000 and say ‘use this and save our school’,” Holloway said. “It’s obviously not that simple.”

Aurora receives grant funding from the state because it’s an alternative school. Holloway proposes to use the grant money to pay a teacher’s salary instead of using it to pay for other expenses.

The corporation also receives money for each student enrolled in the district. By keeping Aurora open, Holloway proposes that the corporation will be able to keep these students in school and keep this money. If Aurora closes, these students could drop out, and the corporation will lose funding anyway. The problem with this part of the proposal, Holloway admits, is that it’s based on speculation.

The corporation also plans to save money by not having a custodial worker. To offset this, Holloway is proposing that the school do their own custodial work, which is what the school did during its first couple years of operation.

Holloway is also offering to get rid of the school’s art teacher. Aurora’s current art teacher is only there for one class period a day, and she has another job in the corporation.

This proposal, if the school board accepts it, would save the corporation $394,414 total, a figure debatable because it rests on speculation of how many students Aurora keeps from dropping out.

Now that the decision has been made, Holloway worries about the rest of the semester.

“It is reasonable to be concerned about what students’ actions will be,” he said. “It remains to be seen what students attitudes and morales will be the rest of the semester.”

Although Holloway admits he doesn’t know what the school’s next step is, he knows the goal is to find the money to keep the school open. Holloway doesn’t know how the school corporation will consolidate Aurora with the two main high schools, but he does know it won’t be the Aurora that students currently know.

“Our goal is to keep them in school no matter what down the road,” he said. “I will encourage kids to get their diploma. Based on what I hear from their mouths, it’s very unlikely that will happen.”

Holloway told students and parents to relax this weekend, but he has kept a pad of paper and pen next to him all weekend, jotting down ideas as they come to him.

“We’ve got work to do,” Holloway said to a school board member following Friday’s decision. “We’re not done.”