By: Purvi Desai
PLUMSTED School district officials are confident that five-year growth enrollment projections, ranging from 2,082 to 2,368, justify the need for a $37.6 million school expansion that goes to voters in December.
Superintendent Jerry North said Monday that school officials are checking to make sure there is no significant disparity in the six enrollment projections and demographic data collected to warrant expansion in the district.
"We are not locked into anything," he said. "What we’re doing is looking if there’s any discrepancy in any of the numbers. I don’t anticipate any changes."
The school board passed a resolution in March to present a $37.6 million expansion proposal to voters on Sept. 26, but the special election was moved back to Dec. 12, following introduction of a $20 million redevelopment bonding ordinance by the township last month. The Local Finance Board, a state regulatory agency charged with overseeing communities’ spending and borrowing, requested additional information from school officials about the bond ordinance at an Aug. 9 meeting. School officials were unable to immediately provide that information, causing a postponement of the referendum.
The school’s officials were scheduled to meet with the LFB on Wednesday, after The Messenger Press went to press, to discuss the referendum. The LFB is responsible for deciding whether the school district can exceed its debt by $34 million, a large part of the $37.6 million expansion referendum. The remaining $2.6 million is expected to come from the township.
The proposed expansion will include additions and renovations to the primary, middle and high schools, a connector addition between the high and middle schools, with a new 350-seat cafeteria and 800-seat auditorium, an additional 400 parking spaces and a new maintenance building.
"The projections are made using historical district enrollment data by grade for the previous three, five and 10 years, depending on the methodology used," Michelle Bellessa Frost said on Monday. She works at the office of population research at Princeton University, and compiled an enrollment projections report for the New Egypt School District.
"Housing data and birth data are also taken into account in the projections," she said. "In short, they project past growth patterns in school enrollment into the future. So, for example, one methodology makes the assumption that future growth with be similar to average growth of the past five years."
Ms. Frost said six models of enrollment projections were estimated, each with differing assumptions, providing a range of possible growth trajectories. "This provides the district with a variety of growth scenarios, and they can choose which one (based on the assumptions used in the projection) they feel will best describe what they expect their future growth trends to look like," she said.
The current enrollment at the Plumsted schools varies between 1,802 students and 1,860 students, factoring in kindergarten through grade 12 and special education students, as well as the different characteristics of the projections, according to Ms. Frost’s report. The maximum enrollment is projected to grow, according to the report, is 31 percent, while the lowest growth would be 15 percent.
"Projections are useful in both the short and longer term," Ms. Frost said. "In the immediate years following a projection, projected enrollment can be compared with actual enrollment. This provides the district with clues as to what is happening with the district growth.
"If needed, they can modify their assumptions about future growth to better fit actual enrollment," she said. "One potential pitfall with projections is that if growth is over- or under-estimated, these errors are carried forward and become increasingly less accurate as time goes by."
However, Ms. Frost said, not too much weight should be placed on any single projection one year out. "Growth should be monitored over time, and compared with projected enrollment. With additional years of enrollment data, projections can be re-estimated and plans can be modified accordingly."
Superintendent North said they cannot take the average from each of the different cohorts or projections to get an accurate figure, therefore they are studying each to see which fits the township schools’ characteristics best.
Mr. North said if the further study of demographic data reveals certain expansions are not necessary, it would be up to the Board of Education to make a decision on how to amend the referendum, if need be.
At present though, he said, "We’re moving forward just as predicted."

