Our priorities are wrong if teachers lose their jobs

I'm an eighth-grade student at Sequoia Middle School.

There have been many budget cuts, which makes a worried setting in schools.

We have already made a lot of cuts and trimmed a lot of corners, but I think that before the teachers start to get pinkslipped, we should find other corners to cut.

I don't know if the district has already seen this, but SURE (Silent Uninterrupted Reading for Enjoyment) is simply a 20minute time slot every day in which we're not allowed to do anything except read.

It may have great intentions, but it's unnecessary.

There have been rumors that next year we're going to get out of school a week earlier to save money, but before that, maybe we could get rid of SURE and get out of class 20 minutes earlier every day. Those 20 minutes every day would add up, and the schools would save money on lighting, staff, etc.

It may sound like I want to get out of school earlier, which would be a nice little perk, but in actuality, that's about 3,600 minutes per year, or 60 hours worth of money that can easily be saved.

If we were to get rid of a week of school at the end of the year, we would only be getting rid of 1,825 minutes, or approximately 30 hours, and those hours would deplete our class time.

There are few other options, but please don't get rid of teachers, because they're the most important part of our school system! Nadia Lynn Newbury Park