OXFORD – SAD 17 directors have approved a $70,000 voluntary donation by the teachers union to avoid the elimination of seven positions.

“We have met our curtailment goal,” said Dr. Mark Eastman, superintendent, of the $70,000. That amount was the minimum necessary to meet a portion of the approximate $500,000 mid-year budget reductions in state General Purpose Aid, he said Monday.

School officials have already cut more than $400,000 from the budget and needed about $70,000 more to meet the reduction goal. Because there was no place else to make the cut, the Oxford Hills Education Association was told the reduction would come from within the salary line item.

A total of 363 association members agreed to pledge a total of $70,467 as of Monday. Any money collected beyond the $70,000 goal will be used to address next year’s planned curtailment, according to Eastman.

Seven positions would have been cut if the goal had not been met, including one high-school and one middle-school custodian, a high-school literacy education technician, a high school intervention coordinator, a literacy education technician at Waterford Elementary School, a middle school special education technician, and a high school study hall monitor.

Eastman said before the meeting that the negotiations with teacher’s union President Jim Thornton went “very well.” The administration agreed not to ask for a furlough day, which would have required re-opening the teacher’s contract for impact bargaining.

“They were very interested in a voluntary give-back day,” Eastman said.

The voluntary giveback or donation process can be done as an outright donation by reducing bi-weekly paychecks over the remainder of the year or by taking an actual unpaid day off. That day would have to be on a professional day or another day that students would not be in attendance so there would be no substitute impact, Eastman said.

The union had turned down a request for a furlough day, which had been suggested in early December. Furlough days, or shut down days where no one is paid, have been used by the state for years as a way to cover budget deficits.

SAD 17 directors have already cut more than $400,000 from this year’s budget, in areas such as repairs, supplies, an activity bus run, and cutting in other areas to meet the fiscal demands of Gov. John Baldacci’s budget cuts. More serious state budget cuts are expected in the next fiscal year, school officials said.

SAD 17 has already instituted a hiring and spending freeze and the SAD 17 mid-management, supervisors and senior management have approved a furlough day.