Dear Pine Bush families and staff,

Great news! The Pine Bush Central School District has launched its official Facebook page, and we invite all parents, students and staff to take a look. We are just starting out, but we plan to include much of the good news that’s happening with our students and staff members. We look at it as another way for us all to stay connected, especially during this very different time.

You can click here to go directly to the page or, if you are already on your Facebook page, search for “Pine Bush Central Schools.” The familiar “PB” from our official district logo will let you know you’re on the right page. We hope you will give us a “like” and enjoy the district news.

And if you have anything to share with us, like photos of your children working diligently on their Chromebooks, taking a virtual gym class or just masking up to stay safe during this pandemic, message us a photo with a caption. We want to share it with our entire Pine Bush community.

We are looking forward to getting social with all of you.

I also want to address the false rumors that we are eliminating all of our monitor and teaching assistant positions. These incredibly valuable school related professionals (SRPs) have a clause in their contract that requires they receive a 30-day notice, if they could be losing their jobs. The security staff (who did not have that clause on their contract) were furloughed a few days earlier. Though we did notify the entire SRP unit that could happen, we also followed that up the next day with a fuller explanation. The true story is that we will spend the next several weeks determining how many of our SRP employees we need, then, before the 30 days has expired, we will be able to more accurately inform those who will be able to keep their jobs and those that may need to be laid off. As we bring back more students into our
schools, those who have been laid off may well be invited back to work, on a seniority basis (also as contractually required).

Since the district has begun to face actual cuts in state aid payments, we need to consider ways we can lower expenses to keep our budget balanced. Since the bulk of the work for TAs and monitors is linked to students being present, that group became a quick focus of our efforts to manage the district’s
finances responsibly. That said, all of these folks are part of our broad Pine Bush family, so we hope that the majority will stay and that others will be able to be called back as we bring more and more children back into our schools. In the meantime, we will continue to assess how we can identify and execute other cost savings, which will be needed until or unless the federal government comes up with a stimulus package that provides relief to New York, so that New York can provide us with the aid we were promised last spring.

Don’t forget to check out our new Facebook page – we are “Pine Bush Central Schools.”

Have a great day,
Tim O. Mains, Pine Bush Superintendent