A Message from Dr. David Glasner: March 19, 2025

With Spring Break around the corner, I would like to take a moment to reflect on the exceptional opportunities available to our students. Many High School students are embarking on international travel over Spring Break, our elementary school students are showcasing their skills in spring theatrical performances and Kindergarten Kickoff, an information fair for incoming students and their families, is right around the corner on April 26. We are grateful for the support of the Shaker Schools Foundation, which offers scholarships for students to go abroad and provides our students with many other unique educational opportunities. 

As many of you are already aware, the District is also facing a more challenging financial forecast now than we have in recent history. We are currently experiencing deficit spending, which means our expenditures are outpacing our revenues, and if nothing changes, our current forecast shows us depleting our cash reserves by Fiscal Year 2029. There are a number of factors that are contributing to this challenging forecast, including that we have not been on the ballot for a full operating levy since 2014, cost of living salary increases, inflation and uncertainty around state and federal funding.

In response to this financial forecast, The District’s Finance & Audit Committee recently recommended placing an operating levy on the ballot in November of 2025, which the Board of Education will be discussing at its April 1st meeting.

In addition, the District is in the process of identifying opportunities for cost reductions, particularly in the area of personnel, since personnel costs and benefits make up the vast majority of District expenses. Based on our current staffing projections for next year, we have already identified approximately $1 million in cost savings and we continue to work to identify more.

Several guiding principles are informing our cost reduction efforts: 

• First, our priority has been to make staffing changes as far away from the classroom as possible.
• Second, we have made every effort to use natural staff attrition — such as retirements and resignations — to reduce our personnel costs and avoid layoffs. 

These cost reductions will require some staff reassignments and we remain committed to navigating these changes while continuing to provide our students with an excellent, challenging and supportive education.

To learn more, I encourage you to visit our Ohio Public School Funding 101 webpage at shaker.org/schoolfunding101 and watch out for #FinanceFriday posts on Shaker Heights Schools social media channels.

As always, thank you for your engagement in our school community and we are looking forward to the remaining months of the school year.