District Workers Go Back to School

Despite school being out of session this past week for Las Virgenes Unified students because of furlough days, some classrooms were still in use.

But instead of kids being taught lessons, it was the district's non-teaching employees who spent May 24 and May 25 paying attention and taking notes in subjects such as playground safety and bullying prevention.

On May 21, the Board of Education approved a two-day work week  for classified employees, who are also known as non-teaching or non-credentialed workers.

Those workers took a 1 percent salary cut for the 2009-10 school year in an effort to help mend the LVUSD's budget woes.

In addition to the opportunity to save money, the district also viewed the furlough as an opportunity to get classified employees up to speed on certain  school issues and to participate in training workshops.

The furlough week  schedule was drafted mainly by Robbie Amodio, director of classfied personnel for LVUSD.

"It was an exciting and valuable opportunity because we don't usually have development time for classified staff," she said. "This gave us the chance to devote two days entirely to them."

Workshop topics included treating common playground injuries such as sprains,  interacting with students with special needs and cyber bullying.

Amodio said she was glad something positive got done on LVUSD campuses while classes were out of session.

"It was an immensely valuable opportunity, and we truly couldn't have done it without the wonderful teamwork that we had," she said.