The Great Falls Public Schools board approved the reduction in force process and criteria should it be necessary depending on the budget.

The board is required to adopt the plan annually, Kerry Dattilo, GFPS human resources director, said during their Feb. 14 meeting.

The budget process for the upcoming fiscal year begins in March with a town hall meeting at 5:30 p.m. March 16 at the district offices, 1100 4th St. S.

During that town hall, Superintendent Tom Moore and the school board budget committee will present the revenue and expense projections and frequently asked questions.

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The board budget committee meets at 5:30 p.m. March 21 at the district office building.

The board budget committee includes Kim Skornogoski, chair; Mark Finnicum and Nathan Reiff.

The committee will review revenue and expense projections as well as public input to formulate a recommendation to the full board.

GFPS budget committee recommends no levy [2021]

They will consider options such as running an operational levy, a technology levy, a safety levy, or no levy.

The full school board will consider the budget committee’s recommendations during their March 28 meeting at 5:30 p.m. at the district office.

If the board determines to run a levy election on the May ballot, the board will have to set an amount at this meeting.

The board voted also unanimously not to renew 25 non-tenured teachers because they were hired for positions on a temporary basis.

Dattilo said that all of those teachers would be eligible to interview beginning in March for open positions.

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The teachers that weren’t renewed were all hired on one-year only contracts and were aware that the position was temporary when they were hired, Dattilo told the board.

Those contracts expire June 3.

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The positions were temporary for one of the following reasons:

• the currently held position was held for less than a full year;
• the currently held position is held in lieu of a tenured teacher on leave;
• the currently held position was filled after the August cut-off date for permanent positions;
• the currently held position is funded as a one-year only position;
• the currently held position is needed in order to place tenured teachers because of enrollment shifts resulting in
  class or course changes, assignments and transfers