Last night was another middle school visioning discussion with the Board of Ed. The discussion focused on different options for reconfiguring the middle schools, including:
- Keeping things the way they are
- Pushing 6th grade back to elementary schools and consolidating 7&8 at Iroquois
- Converting Rosendale to a 6th-grade building and consolidating 7&8 at Iroquois (and re-districting the K-5 students)
- Expanding Iroquois to accommodate 6-8 (possibly consolidating 6th grade at VA until the capital project(s) are complete, about 2 years)
- Suggested moments before the meeting: modifying option 3 so that Rosendale is 5-6 and Iroquois is 7-8
This was a preliminary discussion focused on gathering questions and ideas from the community. The board and administration intentionally left dollar figures off each option so that the discussion would focus on the academic and social experience of students, and the community changes.
Some questions that were raised included:
- If this is driven by budget constraints, what's the alternative to closing a school? Program/Personnel reductions?
- It may not be realistic to think we could rent out VA
- At what point is a school too big or too small?
- Would the county extend the sidewalk to Rosendale?
- How will 6th grade curriculum change under the various options?
- How detrimental is the extra transition involved in having a 6-only Rosendale?
- How much money is at stake? [Deb Oriola told me they had discussed numbers in the $750k range]
- Some parents were simply opposed in principle. "Nothin good ever comes from closing schools."
- Does anyone know of a building in another district that stayed open and useful as a non-school? There are some known examples of buildings that were rented/used for a few years, but eventually fell into disrepair and diminished the atmosphere of the neighborhood.
- Where possible, it was requested that the changes/transitions be limited to MS only, and not be pushed down to elementary level
- Someone said that reducing infrastructure is bad, but better than cutting people and programs.
- The point was made repeatedly that it is easier for a middle-of-the-pack student to get lost (geographically but also socially and academically) at a larger school
- VA is literally in the middle of Niskayuna, so closing it has symbolic ramifications as well as major effects on real estate values.
- Students' opportunities to walk to school would be reduced or eliminated if VA were closed.
- Splitting VA/Iro. by grade-level would potentially have some families driving to 4 different places, being on 4 different PTOs, etc.
- The board is compiling people's notes about Pros/cons/questions and will be posting them to the district website later this week.
For reference, there are about 1000 middle-school students in the district, with slightly more than half at Iroquois.
If elementary school parents have strong opinions, they should talk to the board as early in the process as possible. There is a board meeting on Tuesday, and the board accepts email at any time. There is also a forum tomorrow (the 18th) in South Colonie where parents can discuss funding issues and ramifications with elected leaders. At least part of the budget constraints this year are driven by "unfunded mandates" from the state.
I would also mention that these "round-table" discussions are an excellent opportunity to meet other members of the community and a board member or two. The turnout has been very high (>100 people last night) but not so high that your voice isn't heard. There were 7 groups last night with about 15 people each.
