The Pittsburgh Public Schools will continue to cut personnel and may require some high schools to drop or share programs as the district struggles to improve academics while trying to stave off a $7.1 million budget deficit projected for 2009.

The district Monday proposed eliminating 203 positions, including 131 teachers, for the next school year. The cuts, many through retirements, would save about $8.9 million a year. The district said it wanted to find another $33 million in cuts in 2008 and 2009 to avoid red ink.

Superintendent Mark Roosevelt yesterday said the $33 million would come from a variety of sources, including still more personnel cuts and creative penny-pinching.

For example, he said the information technology department told him the district might save $200,000 a year by turning computers off at certain times instead of leaving them on 24 hours a day.

School board member Theresa Colaizzi suggested Monday that the district could save money by having its tradesmen do small construction or repair projects traditionally awarded to outside contractors.

"We're looking at everything," including ways to cut costs while remaking the district's 10 high schools, Mr. Roosevelt said.

Mr. Roosevelt has cited a desire to shift from large comprehensive high schools to smaller, theme-based schools to give students more academic choices. But he said there could be a trade-off, with a student giving up certain amenities to pursue a particular field of study at a particular school.

For example, he noted that the Pittsburgh High School for the Creative and Performing Arts, a magnet school, has no marching band. Just as CAPA students chose to forgo marching band to pursue special interests, he said, other students might have to make similar decisions in the future as the district tries to maximize resources.

Mr. Roosevelt said a student enrolled at one school might have to take an elective class at another school, and he raised the possibility that high schools would share certain programs or personnel as the district seeks economies of scale. The district also is exploring greater use of distance learning, allowing one teacher to reach students at multiple schools simultaneously.

The gloomy financial forecast presented to the school board Monday comes near the end of a school year that's been trying for students, parents, teachers and administrators.

Mr. Roosevelt closed 22 schools over the summer, in part to save money, shifting thousands of students and hundreds of teachers to different buildings. Apart from the 203 personnel cuts announced Monday, he has eliminated about 300 other positions in the past two years, budget director Peter Camarda said.

"I think there is a high level of frustration among parents in some communities, especially around the schools that have undergone a lot of change," said Carey Harris, interim executive director of the Downtown education group A+ Schools.

But among other parents, she said, there is an "undercurrent of optimism ... While they are anxious about the scope of change under way, I think there is some recognition that it has to come."

It remains to be seen how much more consolidation the Pittsburgh Federation of Teachers will tolerate. The district currently is negotiating contracts with teachers and five other bargaining units.

"It's vital that we not cut programs, not impact what's available in schools for our students," teachers union President John Tarka said.

Mr. Roosevelt said he'd already made progress on the financial front. When he joined the district in August 2005, he said, he was warned of a projected $72 million deficit for 2007.

But the district will end this year in the black, thanks in part to $30 million in savings from school closings, job eliminations and other measures since November 2005, Mr. Camarda said. The district also received an extra $12 million from the state this year and will take about $15 million from its reserve fund to balance the adopted $528.9 million operating budget.

The district will end the year with projected reserves of $57.3 million. Without the $33 million in extra cuts in 2008 and 2009, the reserve fund will go dry by the end of the decade, board members were told Monday.