Seminole school district budget crisis prompts cuts to staff, field trips

Parents and students at Seminole County Public Schools have been largely shielded from the district's financial woes this year. Cuts have been marginal, no schools have closed and teachers have mostly stayed put.

But Seminole's $26.4 million budget deficit got real for many people this week, as a recent district email said it would no longer approve out-of-state and overnight student field trips because of associated costs. Students travel out of state for many reasons, such as athletic and academic competitions that are critically important to participants and their families.

Oviedo High School's color guard team, for example, traveled to Dayton, Ohio, earlier this month and won a gold medal at the Winter Guard International World Championships.

The district quickly walked back the decision following parent backlash, but some in the school community still came to the April 14 board meeting to air their frustrations.

"These trips are not extras. They're real world education. They expose students to professional environments, higher levels of competition, experiences that shape their future in ways a classroom simply cannot," said Jennifer Devine, a Winter Springs High School parent, at the meeting.

Seminole, like many other Florida school districts, faces a massive financial crisis as student enrollment declines by the thousands. The district lost almost 2,000 of its roughly 60,000 students this year, and projects to lose another 2,000 next school year - losses that hurt Seminole's bottom line because schools are funded on a per-student basis.

Neighboring school districts face similar losses and budget deficits as kids use state-paid vouchers to move to private schools and immigrant students flee the system. Orange County's district, which is roughly three times Seminole's size, lost more than 5,000 students and $41 million this year.

But while Orange opted to shutter seven schools to make up the difference, Seminole hasn't closed any campuses and is looking to avoid doing so.

Instead, the district is scrutinizing staffing and travel budgets.

At an April 14 budget work session, Superintendent Serita Beamon said the district was planning to cut more than 280 positions across school and district staff, totaling $23.4 million in savings. Most cuts should be accounted for by retirements and teachers leaving the district on their own, but the extent of the impact won't be known until next school year.

Beyond staff cuts, Beamon said the district could find additional savings in cutting back on travel expenses, such as out-of-state travel for teachers to attend professional development, which carries the cost of substitute teachers to fill in for them. Substitute teachers can cost the district upwards of $100 per day per teacher. That's a big part of the cost for student field trips as well; the district put a total annual price tag of $6 million on the teacher backfills.

The expenses prompted the March 23 email about field trip cuts, but amid the parent backlash Beamon said the restriction would be relaxed to allow schools to demonstrate that they can raise funds to pay both the cost of the field trips themselves, and the cost for substitute teachers. Already, schools fundraise for upwards of a year to cover the cost of large, out-of-state trips.

As the mother of a student-athlete herself, Superintendent Beamon said she can empathize with parents' frustrations.

"They don't see it as a trip that hasn't been approved. They see it as an opportunity lost. And as a parent, I'll just say that hurts my heart," she said.

As controversy built ahead of the recent school board meeting, SCPS posted a statement to Facebook clarifying there was "no new policy or ‘ban' on out-of-state travel."

But Bryan Zimmerman, who spoke at the meeting, called the district's statement "garbage" and said the back-and-forth nature of the cuts pushes families away from public schools.

"A school district that's facing enrollment issues, there must be a level of common sense that I'm not familiar with because I don't see a single angle of how this mandate doesn't encourage parents to go right to Orange County, charters, homeschooling and private schools," Zimmerman said.

Robin Dehlinger, the chairwoman of Seminole's school board, conceded in an interview with the Orlando Sentinel that the changes were "not well communicated."

"What we're trying to do is make sure that as we are in difficult and challenging financial times, we are utilizing our resources to the best advantage of the students. It doesn't really change anything, in my opinion," she said. "We're always going to have these opportunities, and we're not going to say to our children, ‘You can't have these opportunities.'"

Seminole has tried to protect students from the impacts of its financial woes this year, Dehlinger said. But next year, that might not be possible.

"We are getting to a point where we may not be able to fill those deficits," she said.

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This story was originally published April 20, 2026 at 8:06 PM.