Norm Day, the day that the school confirms its enrollment, lands in September. If the enrollment doesn’t reach 418 by that day, then teachers will be displaced and they will have to secure a job at another school. This current year, the school was lucky and did not have to displace anyone.

However, one employee has been notified of their displacement for the 2016-17 school year and will likely not be returning in the fall unless the enrollment increases.

“This year, when we didn’t have enough students to hold our teachers back in October. We would’ve lost two math teachers,” Principal Deb Smith said. “But with the district and my fiscal helper, we put together all the money in all of our different budgets and we were able to save Ms. Felix’s position. So we ended up buying Ms. Felix for this year.”

In an attempt to bring back the music program after music teacher Wes Hambright was laid off in December due to low enrollment, the school set aside money from the budget. The Board of Education recently voted to give every high school an additional physical education or elective teacher. This provides the school with a music teacher. Currently, the school has 12 teachers paid for by the Los Angeles School District (LAUSD). If enrollment increases next year to 418 students, the school will have 14 teachers being paid for by the school district.

“That’s what we’re hoping,” Smith said. “We can hire back and have all of our people back. I don’t know if it will be a teacher that we have here right now, but that’s what we’re hoping: 418 is the magic number to get 14 teachers. That’s the lowest we can go.”

Currently, about $88,000 is being used from the budget to pay for a counselor and an attendance counselor. The school psychologist and office tech cost nearly $64,000. The remainder of the school’s budget stands at only $38,000.

The school’s student enrollment dropped to 360 students this school year. For this reason, the school lost positions in the mid-year. In order to accommodate all the school’s needs, the school enrollment will have to reach 418. According to Magnet Coordinator Nicole Bootel, the school is not likely to reach its enrollment goal.

“Currently we’re at 405 students for next year,” Bootel said. “That’s  with everybody who is signed up and everybody who’s currently here. My guess for next year is 410 and that’s picking up a few kids over summer.”

The school will not know the total number of students in the school until the waiting list is reviewed. Usually, the number of freshmen is not confirmed until the new school year starts.

The district pays for the principal, the school administrative assistant, magnet coordinator, plant manager, night custodian, nurse one day per week, cafeteria staff, campus security and teachers. This year, a portion of the school’s budget was set aside to keep a math teacher and another as a math substitute.

“We have a demographics team that projects enrollment and we base our initial staffing levels on those estimates,” said an LAUSD spokeswoman who didn’t want to be named said. “However, we won’t know until the start of the school year whether those numbers are spot on or whether teachers will be displaced or reassigned to meet the actual need.”