LHS Called 'Good Match' For Wheeler Students

The town council’s liaison to the school board last week said he feels Ledyard High School is by far the best of several outside options available to North Stonington should it decide to close Wheeler High School.

Councilor Jim Diaz said Ledyard would be “aggressively pursuing” North Stonington students in the event Wheeler – the state’s smallest high school – should close.

This week, schools Superintendent Dr. Michael Graner clarified the district’s position with regard to Wheeler High School and North Stonington, whose schools received an accreditation warning from the New England Association of Schools and Colleges based on a several facilities shortcomings.

“From the beginning we’ve made it very clear that Wheeler students would be enthusiastically welcomed, and that we would do whatever we can to accommodate them,” he said.

But Graner said he understands that the decision about whether to close a school is “gut-wrenching” for any community. 

Other options

North Stonington schools Superintendent Natalie J. Pukas said her district has other, less drastic options besides closing Wheeler High School or spending $30 million to replace it, including renovations and improvements that could be made.

“The question is not whether we close Wheeler or build a new school,” Pukas said. “The question is what is best for our kids educationally, and what makes the most sense fiscally for the town. It’s not an either-or thing.”

The report from NEASC noted various facilities failings that the district has been working to address. For example, Pukas said, the high school now has new boilers as a result of the report.

Other shortcomings, however, such as the small cafeteria at Wheeler, will be more difficult to correct. “Right now students eat in five waves, beginning at 10:30 a.m.,” she said.

For 1996 Wheeler graduate Kathleen Traylor, who met her husband, Jason, when the two were students at Wheeler, the school will always have a special place.

“Wheeler students get a lot more one-on-one attention than they would at an NFA – not that NFA is a bad school,” said Traylor. “But the school means so much to the town socially. It’s such a small town and such a great place, and to take that big chunk away would be a huge loss.”

Nevertheless, Pukas said North Stonington will soon need make a commitment to education – probably by the end of the school year – one way or the other.

“Wheeler High School is the heart of the community, and that’s the sentiment you will get from most of the townspeople,” Pukas said. “But they will need to make a commitment, and that commitment will be financial.”

Benefit to Ledyard

There are several reasons an influx of some 220 students from North Stonington would benefit Ledyard, Graner said. By serving North Stonington, Ledyard High School would likely qualify as a “cooperative school,” similar to East Lyme High School after Salem made the decision to send its high school students there.

Cooperative schools receive an additional 10 percent in state educational reimbursement, Graner said. “It’s a nice incentive,” he said, adding that East Lyme was able to build a new math and science wing with the extra funds it received.

Among the four schools that have offered to accept Wheeler students – Ledyard, NFA, Griswold and Montville – Ledyard, whose tuition is around $10,000 per student, appears to be the most cost-effective.

Graner said Ledyard High School, as a smaller school of about 900 students, might feel more familiar to Wheeler students than Norwich Free Academy, which enrolls around 3,500 students.

“Socially and culturally, a small school is very different from a large one,” said Graner, a former principal at the 350-student Tourtellotte Memorial High School in Thompson. While a larger school like NFA might offer more academic opportunities, a smaller school can provide more athletic and leadership opportunities, he said.

Graner said he thought Ledyard would be a “good match.”

“But we need to let the process run its course and respect North Stonington as it struggles with this decision.”  In this way, he said, “we can show that we understand the difficulty of the decision, and also show our compassion for the community.”