Class change mulled

Moving from half- to fullday kindergarten among options discussed to improve test scores

North Penn School District officials have been talking for much of this month about how to help some of the district’s youngest students, and that conversation looks likely to continue.

The district school board’s Education, Community and Policy Committee heard a presentation earlier this month on how to provide additional education for kindergarten students, and they, and ultimately the full board, may soon discuss whether to switch from half- to full-day kindergarten classes.

“Representatives of the kindergarten committee presented five options for improving the achievement of kindergarten students in our district,” said ECP Committee Chairwoman Terry Prykowski.

“The options are: smaller class sizes, summer camp for all buildings, extended day for students needing support, full-day kindergarten, and increased partnerships with local learning providers and families,” Prykowski said.

According to the documents presented to the ECP committee, higher state testing standards have led a district kindergarten committee to analyze recent testing trends, which have shown a decline for the past four years in the number of students meeting early literacy benchmarks as they come into kindergarten.

A DIBELS (Dynamic Indicators of Early Literacy Skills) test is administered to students three times a year, in fall, winter and spring, and in 2013-14, 78 percent of students met the baseline benchmark of that test, a percentage that fell to 66 percent in 201617. The district’s math baseline test, which is administered in September, showed a similar trend: 96 percent met benchmark standards in 2013-14, but that number fell to 83.9 percent, meeting the benchmark in 201617, according to the presentation to the ECP committee earlier this month.

The five options presented to the committee for ways to raise those scores each had their own pros and cons. Smaller kindergarten class sizes could increase engagement and allow more individualized teaching, but could cost more for staff and materials, and some studies have shown smaller sizes produce little impact. To achieve class sizes of 20 students or fewer for kindergarten throughout the district in the 2017-18 school year, an additional fourand-a-half teacher positions would need to be added, at an increased estimated cost of roughly $337,000 per year, according to the presentation.

Providing a pre-kindergarten summer camp could help develop skills and benefit those who had no preschool, but could impact summer schedules for both families and staff, while adding costs. The committee discussed an option for three district elementary schools to house roughly 65 students each, which would require a total of 12 teachers and six assistants and produce a total estimated salary cost of

roughly $36,000 per year.

The third option, of providing extended day support, could benefit students with low test scores or those not ready for kindergarten, but would also carry costs for personnel, space, and transportation. Students at Oak Park and Knapp elementary schools showed gains in test scores from a similar program, and costs are estimated at roughly $299,000 per year for four full time equivalent positions.

The full-day kindergarten option could produce reading and math gains for students, and give them more time in classrooms to build their social and behavioral skills, while the district could see cost savings from not running school buses between morning and afternoon sessions. The negatives from doing so could be space availability, increased personnel and supply costs, and finding and furnishing classroom space for full-day kindergarten at all 13 district el-

ementary schools.

“Two of the concerns expressed by the committee were cost and classroom space,” Prykowski said.

According to the district presentation, roughly $200,000 would be saved from not running school buses at midday, but those gains would be lost by having to run more buses once each day to accommodate more students in the morning and afternoon.

Implementing full-day kindergarten would require 24 new full-time equivalent teachers, and when calculating a starting teacher salary of $49,000 and the added benefits and retirement expenses, the total cost would be just shy of $1.8 million for teachers alone. Furnishing 20 new classrooms would cost an estimated $259,000, and adding curriculum materials to those rooms would add another roughly $262,000, bringing the total estimated annual expenditure to $2.32 million in the first year, and roughly the same amount in the subsequent second and third years.

The final option, which includes enhanced partnerships with local early learning providers, would rely on personnel already in place and could be more specifically targeted, but other parties must be willing to partner and their programs could vary or have insufficient resources.

“Additional information about the full-day kindergarten option, including the results of the long-range enrollment study being conducted by the Montgomery County Planning Commission, was requested by the majority of the committee,” Prykowski said.

School board and ECP committee member Suzan Leonard said she would rather have the discussion at the full board level, rather than the committee, sooner rather than later.

“The committee took a vote to not bring this up to the full school board, not to have any further discussion, and I would like to ask this school board to at least have this presentation made to us in full,” Leonard said.

“At that committee meeting, what was recommended was that we not bring anything forward until we had full information, in particular the longrange enrollment study,” Prykowski replied.

Leonard said she thought the long-range county study would likely show more information about populations throughout the district, but not whether the district should go ahead with any of the recommendations, and said the lengthy public feedback from parents interested in the discussion would be better heard by the full board.

“I was upset that it was tabled and there would be no further discussion about it, and so were the people that came up to this podium,” she said.

“We’re not asking that anybody approve it. We’re asking to have a little more conversation about it,” Leonard said.

Board President Vince Sherpinsky said he had reviewed the presentation and details on the various options, and said he personally supported the summer camp option but would rather wait for the county study.

“I think that’s what Mrs. Prykowski just said: ‘as long as all of the information is available,’ Why would we have a partial discussion?” Sherpinsky said.

Superintendent Curt Dietrich said Montgomery County Planning Commission officials are scheduled to meet with district administrators, and could present the results of that study at a future public meeting.

North Penn’s Education, Community and Policy Committee next meets at 6:30 p.m. on June 12 and the full board next meets at 7:30 p.m. on June 6, both at the district Educational Services Center, 401 E. Hancock St. For more information visit www.NPenn.org.