As many have heard, perhaps from first-hand experience in their own classes, or from a friend who went through it themselves, a number of classes at Downey High School are being uplifted and/or displaced. The question is why is this happening?
There had been a larger number of students expected to attend Downey High School than there ended up being. Therefore, there was ultimately a surplus of teachers hired to educate these students after several teachers had retired after the 2022-2023 school year. The issues arose when it was revealed that there weren’t as many students enrolled for the 2023-2024 school year as expected. Beyond Downey, a wave of declining enrollment is hitting schools all across California.
The principal, Mr. Houts, had to therefore proceed as instructed by the Downey Unified School District, and unfortunately had to fire several teachers, or move teachers to teach other subjects, subsequently causing the students in these classes to change teachers and their schedules.
Classes that aren’t a part of the A-G requirements with teachers who are able to teach other classes were so of the first effect. Teachers who had just been hired were also first-in-line to fear of losing their jobs. Foundations in Law, an elective class dedicated to informing students about American law taught by Mr. Frisher, was dropped. Similarly, Mr. Brever lost his third-period Computer Programming class. There are many classes, teachers, and students being affected by these unforeseen circumstances.
Teachers have also been affected by the fear of getting laid off. One of the possible reasons for these being the consequences of low evaluation ratings. Forty-six districts in CA (31%) use seniority as the preponderant or sole criterion for teachers’ layoff. This is also affecting the students since they are no longer able to partake and learn about the subjects they had originally chosen to take and had wished to learn more about.
“I had chosen Foundations in Law because last year, I did teen court and I wanted to learn more about the law.” Shelya Diaz, 12 said when asked why she’d chosen the class. As a result of the cancellation of the course, she had to switch to third-period drama. “At first I didn’t really like it, but I’ve grown to be fine with it. I feel fine about drama because I am learning new things.”
Lastly, I, Angelina Andrade, would like to share a personal experience with the schedule changes. I had been taking sixth-period Foundations in Law with Mr. Frisher. I had been devastated to find out the class would be getting cut, as Mr. Houts came in to talk to us about why it was happening. I understand now that it was because of decisions out of our administration’s hands, but nonetheless, it is still unfortunate. I am now in AP Research, a class I hadn’t had an interest in previously, but now I am being helped by Mr. Castile, who has made the transition much easier.
These changes earlier in the year, less than a few weeks in, had originally come out of nowhere, but now, thanks to our hard-working counselors and teachers working around these changes, the hope is for things to begin to settle and for students to all be able to continue onwards in their education.
