Lincoln County School District Superintendent Terry Bristerfinished his rounds Wednesday morning after giving out “about 20letters” to certified teachers notifying them they will not berehired for the 2004-2005 school year.

In Lawrence County, Superintendent Russell Caudill said he alsowaited until the last minute to release the bad news to teachers inhis district.

“I will begin today visiting with the teachers and giving them aletter,” Caudill said. “I was waiting to the last minute hoping thelegislature would come through with some funding.”

Ten teachers in the Lawrence County School District will nothave their contracts renewed to teach next year because of budgetcuts, he said.

“We will be looking at cutting some non-certified positions aswell, but they don’t have to be notified by April 15,” Caudillsaid.

April 15 is the last day for school districts to sign intentforms informing certified employees that they will not bereemployed. According to state law, certified employeesautomatically keep their jobs if not notified.

Brookhaven and Lincoln County School Districts will also becutting non-certified positions once the budget is passed and theyknow how much money they have.

Superintendents here are also scrambling to meet the deadlinewhile making preparations to cut up to 46 teaching and otherpositions.

Dr. Sam Bounds, superintendent of the Brookhaven SchoolDistrict, has recommended to the board of trustees that 31.5positions be phased out for the 2004-2005 year.

Seventeen of those 31 positions are certified, he said, and ofthose 17, eight will retire, two requested not to be rehired andthe other seven would be phased out.

The other 12 full-time and one part-time job are made up ofteacher assistants or classified positions. Two maintenanceemployees would not be rehired.

School officials have looked in all areas, from maintenance toteaching positions, the superintendents said.

“I’ll cut back in all other areas before I cut certifiedemployees,” Brister said.

The 20 notification letters Brister handed out Tuesday andWednesday were “all basically first year teachers. We’re hopeful wewill get more money and be able to reemploy those people,” he said.”We need these teachers. We can’t operate without them.”

School officials analyzed all areas of school operations beforedetermining they needed to cut teachers, Brister said. Janitorialand maintenance departments, the bus barn and teachers’ assistantswere all considered prior to cutting certified personnel.

“Even if I raised taxes, I couldn’t afford to pay them,” hesaid.

The legislature has seesawed on the education budget in pastweeks, promising more positive figures and then appearinguncertain, and a House bill fully funding education has been sentto the Senate. The House bill, however, has generated somecontroversy of its own for its creative accounting.

“I pray every night they’ll come through and not disrupt oursystem,” Caudill said. “I can’t think of a worst time for this tohappen.”

Teachers need to be concentrating on meeting the No Child LeftBehind assessments held the first week of May, Caudill said, butthe current budget situation makes it difficult for them to thinkabout the testing.

“Now, instead of concentrating on meeting those requirements,they’re distracted with worry over whether they will even have ajob or not,” he said.