Washington to decide future of high school students
By: Mark Moffa
WASHINGTON — The High School Advisory Task Force subcommittees presented the Board of Education with their final reports Tuesday night in front of about 200 residents during a special meeting at the Pond Road Middle School.
The 26-member task force, consisting of 13 community members and 13 individuals associated with the school system, was charged with investigating all of the school district’s viable high school options for the future.
Washington, which has two elementary schools and a middle school, currently sends its high school students to Lawrence High School. The district’s contract with Lawrence expires in June 2005.
The task force identified four distinct options and divided into subcommittees accordingly. The options included renewing the agreement with Lawrence High School; establishing a sending and receiving relationship with another school district; building a high school in Washington; or forming a regional school district with nearby municipalities.
Following the subcommittees’ reports, during a public question-and-answer session, many audience members appeared supportive of the plan to build a high school in Washington.
Several residents gave testimony as to positive experiences they had in small high schools.
Carol Boyne suggested that the board place a question on the ballot in November just to get a feel for what the residents think.
“I really think that you should go after an objective wide-net view from the public,” Ms. Boyne said.
She then reminded the audience: “It only takes a petition to get it on the ballot.” The crowd erupted in applause.
Sharon DeVito presented the report from the subcommittee on remaining with Lawrence High School. She said Lawrence will have to either combine its existing middle and high school properties into a middle school campus and build a new high school or simply expand both the middle and high schools if Washington continues to send its students to Lawrence.
Ms. DeVito, whose report was based on a survey in which only 32 parents and 26 students responded, said that transportation seemed to be major concern of the survey respondents.
“What we found was that transportation was an overwhelming concern,” Ms. DeVito said. “We think that it’s very important … that we invest fully in running multiple after-school activity buses.”
According to the report, some students must wait almost two hours for transportation home after school.
Robert Brown delivered the report from the subcommittee on establishing a relationship with a district other than Lawrence. The report compared state Department of Education Report Card information on Allentown, Hightstown and Lawrence high schools, as these were the districts interested in a sending/receiving relationship with Washington.
“We only took the information that was available from the state,” Mr. Brown said. “What we would recommend to the board … is that they would go out and walk the high schools.”
Mr. Brown suggested that further firsthand investigation of these districts would be necessary.
Ken Caitano presented the findings of the subcommittee looking into building a high school in Washington. He outlined the advantages and disadvantages of such action.
Advantages would include the proximity of a high school in Washington, smaller class sizes and student/faculty ratios as compared to an increasingly overcrowded Lawrence High School, and a sense of community pride and identity.
Disadvantages include an increased tax burden, fewer course offerings and the process of phasing students out of Lawrence.
“We agreed that we would look at the population of 600 high school students at the year 2005-2006,” said Joan Roberti at the beginning of the meeting. Ms. Roberti was chairwoman of the task force.
Paul Loriquet, in continuing the report on building a high school in Washington, spoke to the advantages and disadvantages of a small high school.
“Out of the top 20 high schools (in New Jersey), seven had enrollments of below 700 students,” Mr. Loriquet said. He also noted, though, that the curriculum of a small school is typically not as rich as that of a large school.
Paul Edgcomb presented the plan for subcommittee on regionalization.
“Regionalization is a very long and arduous process,” Mr. Edgcomb said. “It’s not something you can go into very lightly.”
He spoke of the possibility of establishing a relationship with Upper Freehold, Allentown and Millstone — which all send students to the Upper Freehold Regional School District’s Allentown High School.
“Regionalization is a high-risk proposition which is very difficult to enact except in the most favorable of circumstances,” Mr. Edgcomb said.
Vincent Yaniro, a financial consultant hired by the board to assess the property-tax effects of each option, then addressed the crowd.
His findings were used to compare the cost of each model and were not intended to provide actual tax rates.
Mr. Yaniro determined that continuing the current relationship with Lawrence would be the cheapest course of action, with a tax rate of either $2.34 per $100 of assessed property value or $2.48, depending on whether the Lawrence School District decided to build a new school or two additions.
The school tax rate for 2000-01 is $1.69 per $100 of valuation.
Mr. Yaniro’s report showed a tax rate of $2.53 for building a school in Washington Township and between $2.50 and $2.55 for a regionalization plan.