Years of budget cuts have hurt schools, students

On Monday, Nevada legislators observed Education Awareness Day. Thousands of teachers started their day with few resources and overcrowded classes and, in Clark County, they taught 50,000 students who do not speak English as their primary language. They ended the day the same way they started: exhausted, but ready to start the next day to do the same thing — teach.

On Monday, something was different. Teachers were no longer invisible. Instead, 9,000 teaching professionals in more than 300 Clark County schools united to make lawmakers aware of what’s happening in their classrooms. They showed their support for creating stable, adequate funding for schools by wearing “More 4 Schools” buttons, giving voice to the needs of our schools.

Before the Nevada legislative session started, Gov. Brian Sandoval proposed an increase of $137 million in the state’s education budget. Prior to that, Senate Minority Leader Michael Roberson, R-Las Vegas, proposed $20 million in funding for Clark County’s English Language Learner program. Last week, Democrats introduced their five-point education platform, and they will soon spell out how to pay for it. Our state affiliate, the Nevada State Education Association, qualified an education initiative that will generate more than $800 million in additional revenue for public schools if adopted. Education funding isn’t a Democratic or Republican issue. Everyone agrees that more funding for education is needed.

As educators, we have reached the point where less funding means less for our students and schools. We cannot continue on this path.

Every year, Nevada’s 28,000 teachers spend close to $28 million out of their own pockets to help pay for classroom supplies for which school districts have no money. On average, teachers spend nearly $1,000 for essential classroom supplies.

Over the past five years, school district budgets have been cut by more than $800 million. This has resulted in schools being stripped to the core — cuts or elimination of programs, overcrowded classrooms (especially in Clark County, where more than 217 elementary schools are above capacity), and in the elimination of ELL resources and programs — to name a few of the resources our schools are forced to do without.

Our legislators are failing our students. Our communities must demand more.

In Clark County, where more than 309,000 students attend school, the needs are magnified by the lack of ELL resources. More than 50,000 students depend on those resources, yet find them unavailable because the state has failed to allocate funding. How can we help these students succeed when we don’t have the tools and resources? It is a system set up for failure.

Teachers and students live daily with the consequences of shrinking school budgets. The largely overcrowded classrooms make it challenging for teachers to provide students with needed one-on-one attention. Completing assignments is often difficult, as classrooms have outdated textbooks that do not match the curriculum and teachers cannot copy the pages, as copy paper is in short supply. Classroom resources are so limited that by the second or third month of school, teachers have already used the supplies provided.

We must change course if we want a better future for our children and our state.

Thousands of Clark County teachers are geared up to advocate for public education throughout the legislative session because they know, firsthand, the consequences of an ill-funded education system. On Monday, we made legislators aware of the realities in our classrooms.

Join us in this cause. Contact your legislators and demand more funding for our schools. Working together, we will provide our students — our children — with the tools needed to succeed and thrive.

Ruben R. Murillo is president of the Clark County Education Association, the union of teaching professionals representing more than 17,000 teachers in Clark County’s public schools.