DUBLIN — Although the school year is barely underway, a Dublin Unified School District union official is warning that employees are already experiencing some “burnout.”
Karen Pagan-Chamberlain, union president of the district’s Classified School Employees Association Chapter 439, recently told the DUSD School Board that her members are experiencing “early burnout” after the board in February voted to cut $6.3 million from its budget and eliminate about 30 jobs, including 13 teaching positions, five custodians and other jobs, including assistant principals, technicians and secretaries. The cuts went into effect July 1.
Pagan-Chamberlain, who works as a campus supervisor at Emerald High School, said the first day of school on Aug. 12 was “filled with a lot of concern” from employees regarding stress, low morale and communications with district management.
“We begin this year with a shortage in our custodial care, ongoing breakdowns in nutrition from the child nutrition department, and increasing expectations from leadership that both classified and certificated staff ‘pick up the slack,’ without the necessary resources or support,” Pagan-Chamberlain said at the board’s Aug. 12 meeting. “This is creating stress already, early burnout and an undeniable impact on employee morale.”
School board president Kristin Speck did not respond to a request for comment.
In an interview last week, district Superintendent Chris Funk called Pagan-Chamberlain’s comments “unfair” and an “over-exaggeration.”
“It was a loaded comment that kind of spanned the globe,” Funk said. “I’m not going to put any words in her mouth, but to say people already have burnout the first week of school, I mean come on.”
But several district staffers told this news organization that the effects of the district’s budget cuts are clear. One Dublin schools custodian, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation from the district, said in an interview that he “just feels like we’re always fighting to find coverage to save the district some money.”
“As they cut us, they want us to do more work, and they put out more obligations for us,” the custodian said. “We don’t get the communication.”
The custodian said the recent budget cuts have left the maintenance and operations departments often struggling to find replacements for employees on vacation and sick leave. The worker also said as schools such as Emerald High grow, maintenance staff are left with higher workloads and no extra help.
The school, which opened last year as the county’s first new high school in over 50 years, welcomed a new 11th grad class, while a second education tower with 39 classrooms including shop-style classes for learning trade professions, an upgraded sports facility and visual performing arts rooms were unveiled.
“With the opening of the new buildings, they know they need more custodians, but they do the hiring right before school starts,” the custodian said. “They’ve known for a year that they were going to open this building.”
One of the district’s food service workers, who also asked to remain anonymous, said that a large part of the district’s kitchen staff has to skip their daily breaks because their workloads are too demanding and staffing is too low.
“We are short staffed, we are never covered,” they said. “We are spread thin, and the job expectation is insane.”
To make issues worse, they said, the district’s starting pay for kitchen workers is $17.56, according to the district’s salary schedule. That’s less than fast food companies, which now pay upwards of $20 an hour. Other employers also don’t require a background check and fingerprinting, which prolongs the hiring process, they said. In an effort to keep the kitchens running, the district asks some workers to work at multiple schools, which has lowered morale, the worker said.
The board’s cutbacks totaled a loss of more than 16 full-time certificated jobs, or teaching and administrative positions, and over 14 classified jobs, which included five lost custodians, four secretaries, a facilities technician, a contracts and purchasing manager and two general instructional assistants, among some smaller cutbacks in other jobs.
“It makes it hard on the other schools that are already shorthanded when you take another person from them,” the food service worker said.
Funk said that the district asked teachers to “pick up after themselves at the end of the day,” and “to place wastebaskets outside their door so they can be disposed of quicker” in the face of the custodial cutbacks.
“I don’t see that as a shortage,” Funk said. He added that Pagan-Chamberlain complained of burnout when “we were in school for one day. I just can’t comprehend her statement and what it means. I think it was an overstatement.”
Brad Dobrezenski, president of the Dublin Teachers Association, said in an interview that Funk’s comments “seem a bit reductive” of custodians’ job.
“That’s not what our custodians do. They’re not just there to pick up trash. They’re there to make sure the environment is safe for our kids,” Dobrezenski said.
This school year, many 6th through 12th grade teachers started the semester with more than 40 students per class, up from the ideal size of roughly 30, he said. The larger class sizes, along with “heartbreaking” cutbacks, are negatively impacting students’ learning and teachers’ workloads.
“Our members are passionate, and that can lead to a burnout. Passionate people do burn out because they care so much,” Dobrezenski said.