cutoff date would
raise enrollment
Hope is that later
cutoff date would
raise enrollment
By sherry conohan
Staff Writer
EATONTOWN — The cutoff date for kindergarten could be eased by a month, to Nov. 30, under a proposal before the Board of Education.
An entrance policy change, moving the final cutoff day back from Oct. 31 to Nov. 30 was introduced by the board at its meeting Monday night.
Under the present policy, children must be 5 years old by Oct. 1 for entrance to the all-day kindergarten without having to take a test.
Children who turn 5 between Oct. 2 and Oct. 31 are allowed to enter kindergarten if they take a test and are judged by a teaching team to be mature enough and ready for school. Parents pay the $125 cost of the test.
The new policy would extend the deadline for entering kindergarten by passing a test, for children who turn 5 after Oct. 1, from Oct. 31 to Nov. 30.
Kevin Gonzalez, chairman of the Legal and Legislative Committee, who introduced the proposal to change the entrance policy, said he hoped that with it the schools, which have been suffering an enrollment decline, would gain a few more students than they would have otherwise.
Gonzalez said another board member, Charles H. "Skip" Fischer, III, who could not be present for the meeting, would like to see the date eased even more and changed to Dec. 31, but would go along with the earlier date.
A second reading of the proposal will be made at the board’s next meeting on June 23 and the policy will be finally adopted at the meeting after that, he said.
On another matter, board member Joseph Gaetano said he had spoken to Brian D. McAndrew, superintendent of the Monmouth County Vocational Schools, at a recent state convention of school boards, and McAndrew had indicated the county vocational school district might be interested in taking over the Walpack Valley Environmental Education Center that the Eatontown school district has operated for the past three decades in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreational Area, Sussex County, but now is giving up.
The Board of Education voted last month to bring the two teachers who have been assigned to the environmental center back to teach in the district’s schools in September, effectively closing down the program there.
Schools Superintendent Robert J. Soprano reported that he had gotten a call from McAndrew asking about the center and the possibility of the vocational district taking over the program and offering it to all schools in the county.
"He was interested," Soprano said. "Whether it will materialize, we shall see."