This story was originally published on LincolnChronicle.org and is used with permission.
Maraya Grove might be the most precocious, confident seventh-grader you’ll ever meet.
When she talks about something that excites her, her eyes widen and she smiles as she pushes her long brown hair behind her ears. It’s held back by a pink bow on the left. Pink ribbons hang off the sleeves of her sweater too and her skirt is a cloud of white tulle.
Maraya is eager to show off her artwork on her tablet to anyone who might be interested. She talks about her future and career plans like a high school senior.
She wasn’t always like that.
When Maraya first started going to Newport Middle School she felt like she was constantly trying to keep pace in classrooms that didn’t have time to adjust to her learning style. She was falling behind and her mother started to think homeschooling might be a better option.
Then she started going to a middle school program called Future Bound, and everything started to change.
“Before Future Bound I wasn’t very sociable, I hadn’t figured out my style, I wasn’t very confident,” Maraya said.
Maraya’s eyes light up when she describes the Future Bound classroom. There are coffee machines, puzzles, games and yoga mats. It’s where she learned how to make different types of coffee, to handle finances and give good customer service. It’s where she learned she loves seeing people’s faces light up when she hands them their order. It’s where she found other kids who are a little misunderstood, maybe even a little “weird” — just like her.
Maraya drew blueprints for the business she wants to open some day and she knows how to put together a portfolio and resume. She also gets more noticed at school and teachers commission her artwork, she said.
“It was a game changer for us,” said her mother, Kendra Blackwell.
But the program, a handful of others and an anticipated 19 positions are on the chopping block because the Lincoln County School District has to balance a $5 million shortfall in its 2026-27 budget.
It’s mostly due to declining enrollment.
Last year, the district had a $2.8 million shortfall and anticipated more difficult decisions this year as enrollment continues to decline in its schools and across Oregon.
And while Lincoln County School district is in better financial shape than most districts in Oregon, students and teachers are just getting up to speed about the difficult decisions that will have to be made this spring.
What’s going on?
The Lincoln County School District is facing a $5 million shortfall in the estimated $86 million general fund budget that it will have to balance with an anticipated 19 staff reductions. It would be the district’s largest round of reductions in more than a decade.
Every year, fewer students are enrolling in the Lincoln County schools, a trend across Oregon since the Covid pandemic. The district is losing about 100 students – mostly elementary aged – a year. A district enrollment study last year projected the district would lose nearly 1,000 students over the next 10 years – about a quarter of the district’s current total enrollment of 4,163 students.
The district lost 151 students in the current school year, according to data from the Oregon Department of Education. School funding from the state is mostly calculated using enrollment, so as the school district loses students, it also loses money.
Enrollment is dropping because Lincoln County attracts an older population, the birth rate continues to decline, families move to seek jobs and housing elsewhere, and parents opt to homeschool.
It’s an issue without much of a solution. All the district can really do is brace.
Tough decisions
There are different ways to right-size a budget, and some are better than others, says district business director Kim Cusick. The three main ways are through cutting staffing, cutting school days or spending the district’s cash reserves.
Last year, the district balanced the budget by not filling empty staff positions and using a wildfire grant. But they did so with the anticipation that more difficult decisions would lay ahead.
Staffing makes up 66 percent of the budget and each school day the district cuts could save $300,000.
Cusick says it’s important to try not to use one-time money to right size the budget because that could put the district in worse financial position for the years to come, especially since declining enrollment is projected to continue. So adjusting staffing becomes the most sustainable solution.
The district tries to balance its budget by cutting positions and reassigning existing staff to vacant positions. But even with that method, there are still cuts that will likely have to be made. The school district anticipates it will have to reduce its discretionary funds by 15 percent.
On Tuesday, the district’s school board unanimously approved an anticipated reduction in force – eliminating 10 teaching positions, three administrative positions and six central office positions.
The district is trying to save where it can and move staff into vacant positions rather than make layoffs, said human resources director Tiana DeVries.
“We aren’t cutting into flesh yet,” DeVries told the board.
Although the district is having to make difficult decisions, it’s better off than many districts in the state with larger deficits. Portland Public Schools faces a $22.5 million projected shortfall in their midyear budget and a widening gap in the following school year budget that may need to be filled with over 100 layoffs. Other districts are closing schools.
Watching what is going on in the rest of the state has caused some school leaders and staff to let out a sigh of relief when they look at the Lincoln County School District’s money issues.
Part of the reason the district may be more financially sound has to do with having healthy reserves but also making financial decisions early that don’t rely on plugging holes with one-time funds.
The district has been holding meetings in school zones to discuss the cuts, the last week in Lincoln City and then Monday night in Newport. There was a meeting Thursday night in Toledo and the last is scheduled Monday in Waldport.
District officials were not able to say what exact positions were under consideration for being cut before the publishing of this article.
“We wanted to have staff conversations early because we want them to know,” said superintendent Majalise Tolan. “I don’t want staff to be blindsided.”
But, while administrators and staff are preparing for cuts to employees and programs, students and teachers may not be ready for the impact.
Real impacts
When Maraya first heard that Future Bound would end there was a wash of sadness.
Part of the structure of Future Bound is having time at the start of class for students to sit in a circle and communicate their thoughts and feelings, what they are struggling with and to offer support to each other. The day the 15 students in Newport’s Future Bound were told about the elimination of the program, several cried.
“At first I wanted to cry,” Maraya said. “I’m really disappointed and now I’m just angry.”
In the circle, they also asked each other questions like: Would you consider being homeschooled if the program gets cut?
All the students raised their hands, Maraya said.
When she heard there were community meetings about the budget cuts she told her mom they had to go to learn more and share why they think it shouldn’t be cut. So, they did.
They learned that cuts meant that class sizes would enlarge to an average of 32 students to one teacher for seventh through 12th grades.
The Future Bound program has two locations: Newport where there are about 15 students and Lincoln City where there are about eight. Some students from Waldport and Toledo come to the Newport location while students that live as far as Otis attend the program in Lincoln City.
The program’s end means that Walport and Toledo area students would go back to attending the closest school near them instead of Newport Middle School.
“I see you,” Newport Middle School principal Marty Perez told Maraya on Monday night. He described her passion for art and said that she wouldn’t go unnoticed as a student in Newport Middle School just because she wouldn’t be a Future Bound student anymore.
That may not be enough to convince her mother.
“Programs like Future Bound and art are not extras. They are places where students find confidence, creativity, mentorship, and belonging,” Blackwell said. “For some students, they are the reason they stay engaged in school at all.”
Blackwell’s priority is to try to make sure her daughter has the time and space to learn the way best suits her. So if the Future Bound program is cut, the pair are set on homeschooling next fall resulting in one less student in the district.
Tolan knows that whatever budget decisions are made are difficult. Early on, she asks principals to always be thinking about what to prioritize. So, the cuts are made collaboratively with the administration listening to what the building-level needs are, she said.
The Future Bound program was first created to fill the gap of an alternative school, Tolan said. But, it was also created during a time when other programs didn’t exist and there were less career and technical education classes and hands-on learning. Now, Tolan believes the types of learning that happened in Future Bound can be spread across the classroom and accessed by all students.
The superintendent also stressed that the budget has not been adopted yet and while there are recommendations, it is also part of the process to engage with the school community.
“It’s so hard because we want to provide everything for everyone,” Tolan said. “We have a decision for recommendation but we are still in the process.”
Several budget committee meetings are planned throughout May before anticipated adoption June 9.
Shayla Escudero covers Lincoln County government, Newport, education, housing and social services for Lincoln Chronicle and can be reached at Shayla@LincolnChronicle.org