ECA Students Walk Out To Protest Budget Cuts

by Lucy Gellman, Editor, The Arts Paper newhavenarts.org

A screenwriting class at the Educational Center for the Arts (ECA) saved Isling Morris’ life. So when they heard that their department chair might not have a fulltime, benefitted job to come back to in the fall, they started organizing. Not just for him—but also for four of his colleagues who were in the same boat.

Now, they have an arts army of students, parents, former faculty members and alumni behind them. Will it be enough to save five full-time jobs that are on the line?

Monday, Morris joined over 100 of their peers to ask that question, as students walked out to protest budget cuts at the long-beloved Audubon Street arts magnet school. Speaking one after the other to eardrum-shattering cheers, young artists urged the administration to reconsider the proposed cuts, which will eliminate fulltime department chairs in dance, theater, music, creative writing, and visual arts. Those faculty members have the option of staying on part time, but will lose their health benefits. They have until April 27 to respond to the agreement with the Area Cooperative Educational Services (ACES) teachers’ union. More on that below.

The proposed cuts come from ACES, the parent agency for ECA, amidst shrinking enrollment and budget woes at the school. Since 2018, ECA has gone from 319 students to 266. The school will also be bringing on a new principal, Kevin Buno, in the fall of 2023. On April 5 of this year, the board of ACES voted to approve a smaller budget, but did not communicate that to parents at the time.

“Department heads are expensive for a reason,” Morris said in a Zoom interview Saturday, as they organized plans for the student walkout. “They do so much work. They have done so much for so long. These people are in it. They're like, ride or die. The fact that they are being viewed as replaceable or cuttable is honestly shocking.”

The cuts, which follow a study from Odyssey Associates and became public last Friday morning, propose dissolving ECA’s full-time (0.8 full-time equivalent, or FTE) department chairs in dance, theater, creative writing, music and visual arts as a cost-saving measure. Under this new model, all five departments would fall under the leadership of a single vice principal at the school.

Meanwhile, current full-time faculty are invited to stay on in a part-time capacity (0.5 FTE), but would no longer have their titles, their same salaries, or access to health benefits. Some of them are the primary health care providers for their families.

Department chairs include Saul Fussiner in Creative Writing, Amy Christman in Music, Johanna (Hanni) Bresnick in

Visual Arts, Mariane Banar-Fountain in Dance, and Ingrid Schaeffer in Theater. In their current roles, they are responsible for designing and implementing the curriculum, hiring part-time faculty and teaching artists, supervising and advising students, and managing the budgets of their respective departments.

Reached by phone and email, three of the five declined to comment.

The proposed cuts result in a net savings of $142,750 per year, according to ACES Executive Director Thomas Danehy. In an email Monday afternoon, Danehy said that the five department heads currently cost the school $528,089 for the 20222023 academic year. Reducing them from full- to part-time staff members, through which they would lose their health benefits, will cost the school $219,508. A new vice principal, meanwhile, will cost $165,831 in the next school year.

Danehy added that part-time staff will also be taking a pay cut: “The approved budget also has reductions of $89,150 for part-time instructors.”

The cuts come less than a full year after

ACES purchased a two-story building at 388 Orange St. for $975,000. So far, no classes are being taught in that building; its previous owners are currently leasing it through August of this year.

“Here, You Don’t Feel Like A Minority”

Monday, students gathered outside the school’s sliding doors on Audubon Street, carrying handmade signs that declared “S.O.S. Save Our Staff!,” “Budget Cuts Cut Opportunities” and “I’m Not Mad, Just Disappointed” among other slogans. For over an hour, close to a dozen of them spoke about the ways in which the school, and specifically its department heads, have supported them as young artists when they don’t always know where else to turn.

As they did, a handful of parent advocates and alumni cheered them on from nearby patio furniture that had been set out on the street. A few representatives of Long Wharf Theatre and Creative Arts Workshop trickled out of their offices to watch.

Students noted that ECA has a model unlike any other school in the state. Dur- and excitement that I hadn’t felt in any of my sending school classes. He brought so much enthusiasm, even if all of the screens had their cameras off. Even if no one was commenting on workshop. He kept on trying to make the community a community, even in a time like that.”

For Borenstein—and with so many of her peers—Fussiner became so much more than an instructor. He was and is a tough but empathetic critic, a thoughtful advisor, and an educator who was willing to read and workshop drafts well beyond school hours. When Borenstein’s cat died her sophomore year, Fussiner checked in on her after getting a message that she would be absent from class. She was floored. That sense of community has carried her through, she said.

“Stuff like that really shows you how much these people care about us,” she said. “We’re not just students to them. We’re people. I also have friends who feel that Saul created this very accepting community for us … a lot of people here feel that this school is a safe haven from our sending schools.” ing the first half of the day, high schoolers from 24 regional districts attend their “sending schools,” or the public schools in the cities and towns that they are from. Then from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m., they come to ECA for three hours of arts education, taught by professionals in the field.

While she is sure that Buno is highly qualified, she added, she does not think he’s capable of replacing five people across five different disciplines. Instead of moving the positions to part-time, she proposed fundraising efforts at the school that will let the department chairs keep their positions and create a more financially stable school going forward.

All department heads are also certified educators. In New Haven, the only eligible sending schools are Wilbur Cross High School and James Hillhouse High School.

Junior Naomi Borenstein, one of Monday’s organizers who is studying creative writing, remembered starting high school in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, when it felt like the entire world had been flipped on its head. As a student at North Haven High School, she trudged through her virtual classes each day just to get to 1 p.m.

It was emotionally and mentally exhausting, she said. And then there was Fussiner, waiting at 1 p.m. to make her day that much better, even if the classroom was just a two-dimensional screen.

“I was just so beaten down,” she said. “And then I would get to Saul’s class. And he would bring energy and passion

For other students, ECA is the place that makes high school bearable. Freshman Gabby (he asked to use only their first name), who is studying visual arts, remembered feeling scared to express himself fully before getting to ECA. But when he stepped into the visual arts department, people could come as they were.

Before speaking Monday, he carefully put together an outfit that included ripped black stockings, short shorts, furry pink wristbands and a matching necklace, heavy eye shadow and a turmeric-colored beanie. “The school has made me so much more confident in my being,” he said. He later praised teacher Hanni Bresnick as “a boss, a beast.”

“Who here loves ECA?!” Gabby said to screams that made it feel more like a rock concert than a walkout. “If it wasn’t for ECA, I wouldn’t be dressed the way I am. I wouldn’t be expressing myself the way I am. I wouldn’t be as confident as I am today. And I think one of the reasons why is … we have such a great community that is fueled by our teachers.”

Viviana Rodriguez, who is a sophomore in the theater department, said she can’t imagine making it through high school without ECA. Each day, she begins classes at North Haven High School, where she feels out of place as one of the only non-white kids. Then she comes to ECA.