Scenes like the one above in a Marysville kindergarten class would occur a bit less frequently if the May 2 operating levy fails. District officials said Thursday night that if the 8.4-mill levy fails kindergarten will move from meeting all day, every day to part-time classes. A levy failure would trigger a hiring freeze across the district and some of the kindergarten teachers would be needed in other classrooms.
(Photo submitted)
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When Marysville Schools began offering all day, every day (ADED) kindergarten, administrators said the move would be a path to success for future students.
Now the very future of the program is tied to the success of the district’s 8.4-mill emergency operating levy on the May 2 ballot.
In previous discussions about a contingency plan should the five-year levy be turned down by voters, officials had said that full-time kindergarten would be at risk. At Thursday night’s school board meeting the uncertainty was eliminated.
If the $9.6-million measure fails in May, the district will return to part-time kindergarten.
Superintendent Diane Allen said the benefits of ADED kindergarten are undeniable, but a levy failure would paint the district into a financial corner.
Should the levy fail in May, the district would make another attempt in November, but the uncertainty of that vote would force the district to begin trimming costs immediately. The goal is to eliminate $2 million in costs, primarily by implementing a hiring freeze, mandating that open positions, from retirements or departures, will not be filled next year.
District officials have to wait until the spring, when employees make plans for the next school year, to evaluate exactly how many positions would be open. Allen said this year’s number of open positions is actually lower than normal, but there still isn’t an easy solution to covering classes.
“There just won’t be enough people to plug the holes,” Allen said.
There are currently 28 positions, or about 5% of the district workforce, open heading into the 2023-24 school year. Two of those slots, an elementary principal and the transportation director, are leadership positions that will need to be refilled. Allen said additional positions will likely come open before the end of the school year.
To help cover the positions, kindergarten would move back to a part-time program, freeing up 11 teachers who can then help fill in gaps in elementary school staffing.
“It’s (ADED kindergarten) not a state requirement,” Marysville Superintendent Diane Allen said.
But in 2015, officials felt advantages to implementing the ADED plan outweighed the extra costs. Historically, the district offered part-time kindergarten, but for the eight years prior to 2015 had offered a tuition based full-time option.
For about $2,000 per year parents could have their kindergartners attend class all day, every day. But, this created enlightening problems.
Not surprisingly, the students paying for the ADED option performed far better on state math and reading tests than their part-time counterparts.
“When we were looking at our student achievement data, what in fact was happening at that time, we were making the gap between the haves and have nots that much wider,” Allen said after the meeting. “And that was really the impetus to either dissolve all day, every day K or offer it for all.”
Allen said that gap in performance led the district to fund the ADED option for all students. After its implementation, the new full-time option also revealed a host of other benefits that don’t show up on state report cards.
“Really, the benefit of every day, all day is early identification to get a jumpstart on literacy, to get a jumpstart on social skills,” Allen said.
She reiterated that benefit of social interactions between students can’t be overlooked, especially in the current climate where the mental health of young people is in crisis.
“The relationships you established with your classmates and building friends are some of those things that impact academic results, but might not have a clear measure to them,” Allen said.
Another student population could also be left without support if the levy fails.
The TRI Academy, which pairs credit deficient students with personalized instruction, would be eliminated to free up additional staff. Team teaching in the eighth grade would also be cut out to free up about eight positions.
Even with the shuffling of existing staff, there is danger that class sizes could swell if the levy fails. To prepare for this the district also increased the maximum class sizes to 28 students in kindergarten, 30 students in elementary and intermediate classes, and 35 students in middle and high schools.
Board member Nan Savidge asked if the state has maximum class size limits. Allen said there is a maximum ratio of students-to-educators, but that number, 25, involves dividing the number of all students by the total staff.
Board member Jermaine Ferguson asked if there is adequate space to accommodate the increased class sizes. Allen said the only issue exists at Edgewood Elementary where there are some space constraints which are being planned for.