District 128 approves staffing report after months of union-administration talks over class sizes and electives

The CHSD 128 Board of Education on March 17 approved the district's annual certified staffing report for 2025-26, adopting a net increase of 2.4 full-time equivalent (FTE) positions after a lengthy staff-and-union review of sectioning and class-size decisions.

Why it matters: The vote formalizes the staffing allocations the district says are necessary to run courses and retain staff as enrollment declines slightly; the teacher union urged the board to prioritize keeping experienced teachers and preserving low-enrollment elective courses that could be eliminated without minimal additional cost.

Paul Karnstead, vice president of the District 128 teachers union, told the board the union and administration followed a memorandum of understanding to review sectioning data and that the process this year was more collaborative than in prior years. "A declining enrollment should not result in losing our talented teachers," Karnstead said, noting the union's view that some small additional FTE (under 2 FTE by the union's estimate) would protect both staff and programming.

Interim district administrators described the multistep staffing process: course selection by students in January and February, program reviews in December, and department- and building-level planning that applies bargaining agreement class "optimums" (most commonly 25 students per class). The district reported an average classroom size of 22.6 students in 2024 and said that the recommended staffing changes reflect programmatic needs including academic intervention, EL services and special services.

Administrators told the board the staffing package includes a 1.0 increase in classroom FTE in some buckets, a 0.5 increase in classroom FTE in other program areas, and a total FTE change of 2.4 districtwide. The report also proposes a contingency pool the board authorized the district to use without returning to the board for every incremental change; administrators said last year the district used 0.8 of a 1.0 contingency.

Union concerns centered on two priorities the union asked the board to endorse: retaining experienced teachers (to maintain institutional capacity for when enrollment rebounds) and preserving elective offerings. The union singled out German 1 at Vernon Hills High School as an example of a course the staffing report did not include for 2025-26 because of low requests, calling that a possible "program killer." Karnstead said the additional FTE the union requested amounted to less than 1% of the district's roughly 300 FTE and urged the board to "support and empower our administration to make some decisions that won't necessarily benefit the bottom line next year but will certainly benefit our schools long term."

Board discussion acknowledged the tension between fiscal responsibility and program preservation. Don Carmichael, who led presentation of the staffing report at the Program and Personnel committee, said the administration had worked with department chairs and building principals to identify priorities and combine courses when feasible (for example, combining two smaller elective classes under a single teacher assignment).

The board voted to approve the staffing report after members praised the collaborative process. The approved staffing report gives district leadership authorization to implement the recommended 2.4 FTE change and to use the contingency authority described in the presentation.

What remains: The staffing allocations will be implemented as scheduling is finalized in the spring and summer; the district said the contingency authority exists to respond to late enrollment changes (for example, summer-school failures or students changing plans) without returning to the board for each small adjustment.

Clarifying details: the district reported a 22.6 average students-per-classroom figure (Illinois report card 2024) versus a state average of 20.8; the staffing package adopted a total FTE change of 2.4; contingency use last year was 0.8 of a 1.0 contingency; the union said its additional FTE request was under 2 FTE and under 1% of district classroom FTE.

The board approved the report by roll call vote and moved on to other agenda items.