WARN notices were sent out of more than 600 teachers in the Virginia Beach school district this year. The notices, which were sent out to all first year, second year and the third year teachers in the district will impact a total of 640 teachers. While all of these educators are not going to be let go, they are being warned so that the schools can get rid of any many of they as they need to when the time to reconcile the budget comes along.

For those of you who are not familiar with a WARN notice here is the definition, straight from the Department of Labor :

“WARN offers protection to workers, their families and communities by requiring employers to provide notice 60 days in advance of covered plant closings and covered mass layoffs. This notice must be provided to either affected workers or their representatives (e.g., a labor union); to the State dislocated worker unit; and to the appropriate unit of local government….In general, employers are covered by WARN if they have 100 or more employees, not counting employees who have worked less than 6 months in the last 12 months and not counting employees who work an average of less than 20 hours a week. Private, for-profit employers and private, nonprofit employers are covered, as are public and quasi-public entities which operate in a commercial context and are separately organized from the regular government. Regular Federal, State, and local government entities which provide public services are not covered.”

While this is not the first year that these notices have gone out, and most of the 3^rd year teachers have received one each year that they have worked for the school, the prospect of being without a job in this market can be daunting.  In addition this year the union seems to be taking the threat of layoffs more seriously than previous years.

Dominic Melito, the President of the Virginia Beach Education Association, the union which represents the teachers who received the notices, said the following about the situation to a reporter for wavy.com, a local television station, “Over the past three years, funding for education has gone down $85 million and we’re looking at another $40 million deficit this year.  Unless the state steps up or city council or both we’re going to have significant cuts this year, this is no joke.”

He also took the chance to urge parents in the area to demand more funding for their children’s education, “Everyone needs to contact delegates and senators and insist on more money for public education…There will be a pre-written e-mail to the General Assembly asking for increased funding for public education in Virginia available on the veanea.org website by early next week. The letter can be edited and the person need only provide their name and address, and the e-mail will automatically go to the person’s delegate and/or senator. People can also keep track of education bills in the General Assembly also by going to veadailyreports.com .”

He did not say where he expects the funds will come from.