Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's State of the City address called for education reform (courtesy Creative Commons)

The Los Angeles Unified School District s dealing with a $407 million budget deficit. More than 7,300 employees, including 4,500 teachers have already received Reduction in Forces notices, according to NBC.

Reduction in Forces notices, commonly known as pink slips means that in June the receiver of the pink slip will be told if they will be laid off. Who ends up getting laid off is based mostly on seniority.

The plan is to prevent mass layoffs and improve the state of California’s public schools which currently ranks 47th nationwide in per-pupil spending.

The plan is expected to include as many as 12 furlough days which it would ask employees to take unpaid, KTLA reports. The furlough days would come from cutting down the school year and having unpaid vacations.

The plan could save the district up to $304 million. Money would have to be taken from funds such as health benefits and worker’s compensation.

The school year would be cut by a week for the third year in a row, according to the Daily Breeze.

Despite some complaints that children’s education will be tarnished by this plan, Deputy Superintendent John Deasy, who will take over as Superintendent April 15, said as many as 80 percent of job cuts could be eliminated. Deasy has personally taken a pay cut of $55,000, or 17 percent, to help the budget as well, according to KTLA.

The plan needs to be resolved before May 1 to repeal layoff notices.

This plan was unveiled Thursday, according to the San Fernando Sun. The plan is part of a package of one-year budget maneuvers.

Deasy outlined the plan to the Board of Education as steps aimed at saving $304 million next school year. The 12 furlough days it would require would likely save LAUSD $144 million. Around $100 million would be borrowed from the Health and Welfare Reserve Fund and around $60 million from other accounts.

Deasy told the San Fernando Sun that the plan would also avoid increases in class size, allow the maintenance of magnet programs, adult-education and after-school programs.

While the moves will save jobs, they are only one-year solutions and unless agreed upon by the unions by the May 1 deadline, will not occur. It is unclear how employees will respond to taking even more furlough days which have already had to take. The budget deficit for the 2012-2013 school year would still be $700 million.

The budget plans came after negotiations broke down in Sacramento over placing tax extensions on the June ballot which would have reduced the deficit by half, according to the Daily Breeze.

During Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s State of the City address Wednesday, he focused on education reform and called for a shift in the LAUSD. The speech was overwhelmingly favorable to building a strong education system for students which Deasy says he will try to maintain while balancing the budget.

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