Boone County Teachers Search for Opportunities after Layoffs

Boone County Schools is in the process of closing and consolidating three community elementary schools. That coupled with a decline in student enrollment lead the county to announce earlier this year they would lay off some 70 employees, including dozens of teachers. 

Many of those teachers attended a job fair Friday to find opportunities in other West Virginia counties.

There are two reasons Boone County Superintendent of Schools John Hudson says the county had to cut positions earlier this year: declining enrollment and declining tax revenues.

Both, Hudson said, can be linked to the coal industry as parents move to find new jobs and coal companies pull expensive equipment that they once paid taxes on from mine sites.

Whitney Harold teaches third grade at Brookview Elementary School and after two years on the job was let go.

In her early 20s, Harold said she and her husband have considered leaving not just their hometown, but their home state after receiving the news.

“It has initially come up,” Harold said Friday, “but we tried to make this conscience effort as long as we can to stay in West Virginia only because my concern, even about leaving Boone County is, what’s going to be left?”

Teachers like Harold had the opportunity to meet with seven county schools systems during the job fair at the Madison Civic Center Friday.  

A Boone County native, Harold said it’s more than likely she– and many of the other young teachers who were let go– will relocate to find a new job before the fall.