The Concord school board won’t decide whether to implement full-day kindergarten for all students until at least January.
But board members asked district administrators Monday to at least include a plan to offer a full day for the district’s youngest learners in the first budget proposal they’ll review next year.
The unanimous vote by the full school board adopted a recommendation made by the instructional subcommittee last week. After a yearlong study, it’s a step toward implementing the most comprehensive of the early childhood education expansions that board members considered.
They held off on any concrete recommendation, however, “so that we can consider it in the context of all these other expenditures that we’re thinking about and really kind of understand what the impact would be on the existing budget,” said school board Vice President Jennifer Patterson.
The budget process begins in January and likely won’t be finalized until the end of March. Some board members originally hoped the issue would be decided by now.
If board members decide to go ahead with implementing full-day kindergarten next year, it’s estimated to cost about $1.2 million. The taxpayers would feel the full brunt of that cost, too, because the state’s education funding formula doesn’t allow any extra money for full-day kindergarten programs, as compared with half-day programs.
The board members will also keep in mind the need for a rushed conversion of heat sources at four schools – costing about $9 million – and the need for either a major renovation or complete rebuild of Rundlett Middle School.
“We’re trying to do a whole lot,” said school board President Clint Cogswell, “and there isn’t anyone at this table who wouldn’t want to do everything we can for all of our children, but we also have to recognize that we represent the whole community and we’re trying to make that balance.”
In the event that the board members decide it’s too expensive to go ahead with full-day kindergarten, they’re planning to devise at least one backup option.
Last week, the instructional subcommittee members considered two possibilities. One was to run a pilot full-day kindergarten at only one of the elementary schools. The other was to offer a combination of full-day and half-day programs at all schools, targetting expanded opportunities at disadvantaged students. There was no consensus, however.
That discussion will resume at a meeting Nov. 28. The full board could then ask at its December meeting that administrators include an agreed-upon backup plan in their preliminary budget proposal.
Any final decisions about programming will occur during the budget process, at which time residents will have a chance to give their input during public hearings.
In a criticism during the board’s public comment session Monday, former board member Betty Hoadley said she hopes the district makes an effort to encourage public participation from a wider swath of the community.
She pointed to an October meeting, when a group of parents of school-aged children packed a subcommittee hearing to speak almost unanimously in favor of full-day kindergarten.
“If the school board’s going to make a big deal out of the fact that 17 speakers spoke that day, I’m going to make an equally big deal out of the fact that that was primarily because this school board notified the parents of every student in the district,” she said. “And no one else was notified.”
She said the district has communicated more effectively in the past and she felt it was an important time to ensure it’s doing the best it can now.
“If you think you got a balanced, diversified response to what you were doing, that is not possible,” she said. “I think this year, more than any, you need to reinstitute those public relations and ramp them up.”
(Nick Reid can be reached at 369-3325, nreid@cmonitor.com or on Twitter at
@NickBReid.)