South is hiring approximately 25 new teachers to staff the building for the 2014-2015 school year, a larger number than in past years, according to South Principal Dr. Brian Wegley.

According to Wegley, South needs more teachers because of the switch to the block schedule and South’s increasing enrollment. Because enrollment is projected to grow from 2,736 students to 2,900 next year, hiring more teachers will keep an average class size of 23, a number that the District 225 Board of Education has consistently kept for years.

“Some are smaller than [23], some are bigger than that, and if you would’ve asked that 10 years ago, that would have been 23:1,” Wegley said.

The number of teachers required to staff the building is determined by a formula set by the district, where one full-time equivalent (FTE) is one full-time teacher. According to the Board of Education website, there is an increase of 18.3 FTE needed for the 2013-2014 school year. Additional hires will be made to replace retiring teachers and teachers leaving South.

The block schedule will allow students to take an additional eighth course next year, which will require more sections of certain classes and therefore more teachers, according to Wegley.

“A lot of the courses that our students would enjoy taking that they haven’t been able to fit in, under the block, they have that whole additional block to utilize,” Wegley said. “We were given an additional 5.6 FTE to handle that.”

Growing enrollment is projected to continue many years into the future, prompting additional hiring each year.

“The reality is every year as we continue to go up we will have more teachers,” Wegley said. “We will have more students and we will have more teachers.”

Different departments are hiring new teachers, according to Wegley. Jeff Rylander, instructional supervisor of the Science Department, said that he is hiring because of enrollment.

“I would say that two of the four [teachers being hired] are due to increasing enrollment issues, which is significant,” Rylander said. “For science teachers, they teach four classes, which is another eight sections – that’s a lot [of new classes].”

Rylander also believes that the Science Department will have to continue hiring teachers over the next couple of years.

“We estimate as many as four additional teachers in Science would [need to be hired] over the next five years as a result of the enrollment itself,” Rylander said.

Rylander said his main concern was office space for the new teachers.

“Physically, in terms of [space] we only have two open desks in the Science Office and four new teachers to put them in, so we’re at a point where we’re at capacity,” Rylander said. “We’re going to be okay next year because we do have two teachers who are [leaving], [but] every desk in Science will be taken next year. The additional hires beyond that, we don’t have a place [for].”

The English Department is also hiring an abnormally high number of teachers, according to Susan Levine-Kelley, instructional supervisor of the English Department.

“We’re hiring 3.7 [FTE]; two of those as a replacement for retirees and 1.7 [are] new and above [the current amount],” Levine-Kelley said.

Additionally, Levine-Kelley said the department is hiring two teachers to replace Mark Ferguson, the current TV/broadcasting teacher who is retiring. That brings the total to about six new teachers.

Like Rylander, Levine-Kelley expects to hire more teachers in the coming years to accommodate enrollment increases. She is also concerned about desk space for English Department aides.

“We’ve always had our aides have a desk, and I always believed [this] symbolically was important because I want them to be part of this department and feel like a full-fledged [member], and we might not be able to do that,” Levine-Kelley said. “It just depends, right now we have enough desks [for aides], but we’ll see [in the future].”

According to Wegley, hiring more teachers is part of South’s priority of maintaining student opportunity, regardless of the size of the school.

“Our goal in this district […] is opportunity over time in athletics, activities and most importantly, academics,” Wegley said.