As we head into Spring Break, I want to take a moment to express my gratitude for the hard work, dedication, and resilience shown by our students, educators, and families throughout the year. This break is a well-deserved opportunity to rest, recharge, and spend time with loved ones.

I encourage everyone to take a moment to relax and refresh. When we return, we’ll continue working together to ensure a strong and successful finish to the school year and continue with the work to prepare for the upcoming school year.

Part of this upcoming work will be the budget adoption process for the 2025-26 school year.

We are all aware of how fragile the State’s school funding model is. The State of Oregon has struggled to fund schools at the needed levels, for many years. This has left many districts relying on temporary funding sources as enrollment drops. Woodburn has largely resisted relying on temporary fundings sources to eliminate budgeted staffing gaps. We have done the difficult work over the past year of evaluating district supports and staffing levels to ensure that they align with the reality of our enrollment and student needs. Through reduced spending, strategic staffing decisions, and tapping into our ending fund balance, Woodburn had positioned itself to be in a healthy financial situation moving into the next biennium.

The current projected Oregon State School Fund budget based on the Governor’s originally proposed $11.36 billion budget is only enough to allow Woodburn School District to maintain staffing levels and program options that are reflective of projected enrollment. However, we’ll be moving forward cautiously, as we move into bargaining with both Associations and somewhat uncertain future federal funding.

At this time we understand that the federal funding model should not change much going into the next school year and funding should be relatively stable. With that said, we will continue looking for opportunities to strengthen our stewardship of public resources in order to brace Woodburn should there be a change to federal funding. While we cannot predict the full extent of possible future federal funding changes, our goal is to work to minimize the impact of possible changes on students, staff, and the Woodburn School District community.

You can find more information on our Budget Committee and Budget Calendar here: https://www.woodburnsd.org/about/school-board/budget-committee

Thank you for being part of our incredible school community. Wishing you all a safe and joyful Spring Break!

Every seven years, school districts select new materials for one subject as part of the Oregon Department of Education materials adoption process. This year, the science department finished their selection process, and the health instructional team began their process. To help teachers decide which will be the best for their students, they review multiple different texts and often test out the materials in their own classrooms. Through this process, teachers have narrowed down their choices and are making a recommendation to purchase the following texts for science:

• Elementary: Discovery Techbook for Elementary by Discovery Education
• Middle School: Discovery Techbook for MS by Discovery Education
• High School: STEMScopes by Accelerate Learning

For Health, the elementary team is able to continue using the same type of materials they have been using for the past seven years—The Great Body Shop by the Children’s Health Market. These are magazine type periodicals that are updated annually and delivered to the school each month. They are designed to be taken home after they are used in the classroom, so that families can learn alongside their students about important health topics.

The Middle School team is still reviewing their options, but are considering Live Well by Human Kinetics and Comprehensive Middle School Health by Good-Heart Willcox.

The High School team is recommending to adopt and purchase Live Well by Human Kinetics.

If you'd like to learn a little more about these Health materials, click the links above. To give feedback on these materials, please complete this Google Form. If you'd like a chance to review these materials in print, we can schedule a time for you to review them at the central office; please contact npete@woodburnsd.org for more information.