There was no school in Buena Vista, Mich., four days last week because of an ongoing budget crisis. The small district—with 27 teachers and about 400 students—laid off most its staff and will not reopen for the rest of the school year unless the state intervenes, the district’s website says. School was scheduled to end on June 13.
The district has been in dire financial straits since 2011, but Buena Vista, near Saginaw, recently took about $580,000 from the state for a program that students were no longer attending, according to the mLive.com news site.
The state education department is withholding payments to recoup that sum, which means the district will be unable to pay employees in the meantime.
Teachers offered to work without pay for the week, but the district indicated that doing so would present legal problems.
