WW-P board backs more talks on elementary grade plan

In October the board voted to keep the current K-3, grade 4-5 configuration.

By: Gwen Runkle
   After nearly two hours of highly contentious discussion on how district elementary schools should be configured for expected growth, the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional Board of Education decided Tuesday to reopen discussion of a kindergarten-through-fifth grade configuration.
   The move to reopen such talks was approved with a 5-4 polling of the board with members Hemant Marathe and Diane Hasling, who voiced opposition the current K-3, grade 4-5 configuration prior to being elected in April, leading the rally. They were joined by Stan Katz, Dee Dee Dodson and Vice President Linda Geevers.
   Voting against the idea were board President Cheryl Larrier-Jemmott, Stephen Smith, Henry Wieck and Michele Epstein.
   Controversy began last October when the school board narrowly endorsed Superintendent John Fitzsimons’ recommendation to keep the district’s current K-3, grade 4-5 elementary grade configuration by establishing a second 4-5 school at Village School. That action, which also was approved on a 5-4 vote, reversed the district’s long-range commitment to a K-5 configuration.
   As the board began to explore options on how to best assign students to the various schools within the K-3, grade 4-5 configuration Tuesday night, Mr. Marathe and Ms. Hasling, along with other board members, suggested that a K-5 configuration would work better.
   Mr. Marathe said he is concerned with how moving from school to school would affect the students.
   "Research shows student achievement and performance decreases with the number of school-to-school transitions (students) make," he said.
   "We need to look at a long-term plan, not a plan of the month or a plan of the year, and quit changing on the fly," Mr. Marathe said.
   Ms. Hasling agreed.
   "We need to honestly look at K-5," she said.
   Mr. Katz, who voted against the K-3, 4-5 configuration in October, said the K-5 configuration needs to be discussed along with K-3, 4-5. Without doing so, he said, the board would waste a month if the latter plan is unworkable.
   But others felt the board needed to stick by its most recent position.
   "The board has committed toward working through a K-3, 4-5 plan. None of (the configurations) are going to be perfect," Mr. Smith said.
   "We need to get real about discussing alternatives rather than complaining about alternatives that are not perfect," he said.
   President Larrier-Jemmott, visibly frustrated, asserted that the board needs to present a unified front to the community. She said it is inappropriate for the board to say, "OK community, we’ve changed our minds again, we may go to K-5. At some time the board needs to move on.
   "I understand some members of the board have strong feelings that only K-5 will work, but the board set forth the best plan for the district and it has to be explored and addressed before we move on to other plans," she said.
   Currently fourth- and fifth-grade students attend the Upper Elementary School. In September 2002, when the Town Center Elementary School is expected to open, half of the district’s fourth- and fifth-grade students will move to Village Elementary, and K-3 students will be moved into the new building and three other elementary schools.
   "We anticipate 4-percent enrollment growth every year through 2007 for the district," said district spokeswoman Gerri Hutner. Complete build-out for the district is expected by that time, she said.
   There are 8,500 students enrolled in the district. A 4-percent increase translates to the addition of approximately 340 students the first year with an increasing number in each of the following years.
   Discussion of elementary grade configuration, including a K-5 configuration, is scheduled for the board’s July 14 meeting.
   In other action Tuesday, the board tabled a resolution introduced by Mr. Marathe to delay implementing Chinese classes to the schedule of fourth-graders at the Upper Elementary School until after the next school year. The topic is expected to be addressed at the board’s next meeting on June 26.
   Forty-eight students have signed up for Chinese for the coming school year, according to Superintendent Fitzsimons.