Expanding Full-Day Kindergarten to All Students Will Strain District's Budget

The Attleboro School Committee continued its discussions regarding full-day kindergarten and began throwing out ideas for some long-term options during a sub-committee meeting Wednesday night. 

The district was able to partially implement a full-day kindergarten program starting with the 2007-2008 school year through the aid of a federal grant for some students, but Superintendent Pia Durkin said its her goal to implement a full-day kindergarten program for all students.

The grant was designed to help schools start a full-day program with the intent of it making it available to all students. At that point the grant would be used to stop a budget gap created by a 24-month delay between the increase in enrollment and adjustment of state funding.  

Full-day kindergarten for everyone would increase the enrollment and therefore create a gap in the school's budget. 

However, due to what business manager Mark Furtado called the “collapse of the economy” the budgets have not increased to accommodate further expansion.

Additionally, Furtado explained that the grant provides $140,000, which does not fully fund the program.

Durkin also provided a bullet point list of additional costs the district would need to consider before expanding the program including:

• additional teachers
• additional specialists (art, gym, and technology teachers)
• health care and professional development costs associated with hiring new staff

The costs of additional furniture, books, teaching materials and additional office staff would be needed to oversee and implement a pay option.

Durkin also made note that the state Department of Early Childhood and Care has guidelines regarding parent pay options, which involve the need for a sliding pay scale. Guidelines require that students, who qualify for free-lunch, would qualify for free kindergarten and that half-day classes would likely still need to be offered.

The committee also discussed the need for a plan to expand the program in the future.

“I would feel better if had that long-range plan,” School Committee Member Melissa Cook said. 

Some of the proposals included:

• having a three-fourths day for all the students, a compromise between half-day and full-day
• Converting one of the existing elementary schools into an early child education center for all of the district’s Pre-K through first-grade students and have the remaining elementary school’s become grades two through four

Durkin made sure to reiterate to parents that these were strictly long-term ideas that would not be implemented in the very near future. 

“There are ways to do this with planning,” Durkin said of the full-day kindergarten expansion.