Proposed Budget and the FDK Mystery

[distribution date - 5/3/09]

This constitutes Part Two of my summary and commentary regarding the 2009/10 Proposed Budget, which was approved by the Board of Education (BOE) on April 23rd for submission to the voters on May 19th. Part One was the synopsis of the budget approval discussion, and Part Two will focus upon the steps which have brought Full Day Kindergarten (FDK) to Elwood starting September of 2009.

First of all, let’s get one bit of distortion about FDK proponents and opponents purged from our collective minds.

While many people tend to focus upon (1) the minority who have adamantly insisted upon immediate implementation of FDK, regardless of objective considerations, or (2) the minority who have opposed implementation of FDK, regardless of objective considerations, most people in this community were neutral, and that includes each of the five members of our BOE, and numerous residents have called for an objective analysis in the context of all of the needs of this district.

The great majority of residents were open to the concept of FDK implementation, if a complete analysis proved that it was (a) fiscally responsible, and (b) done within the priority schedule of all needs of this K through 12 district, and (c) done without harm to current students in Grades 1 through 12.

I attended nearly all of the BOE’s budget work sessions, and discussions of the budget at regular meetings and at general work sessions, and also attended nearly all meetings of the Citizens Finance/Budget Advisory Committee (CFBAC), having been a member of that body since its creation over five years ago.

Anyone who attended these various BOE sessions had heard, repeatedly, calls by various trustees, particularly by the Board President, for more definitive information which should include a comprehensive analysis of the 2008 proposal by the Superintendent to implement FDK in 2009/10.

At the April 23rd meeting, after various trustees had made comments about disappointment (I’m using a mild word, considering the reality) in the lack of clarity of the information which they received from the District Administration, there was one somewhat visceral reaction by Harley Principal Dr. Cancroft, during Trustee Ciccone’s remarks, that seemed directed to the wrong person, since Dr. Cancroft had been providing her input to the Superintendent, Mr. Cenerelli, and Mr. Cenerelli was providing his response, and his analysis, to the Board President and to the BOE.

Dr. Cancroft obviously feels that she provided all necessary information to justify the BOE agreeing that FDK should now come to Elwood, yet it was not her responsibility, but that of the Superintendent, to provide the comprehensive analysis which the BOE, quite properly, required.

Moreover, we do not know, since Dr. Cancroft provided her input to Mr. Cenerelli, whether the original work done at Harley was a true comprehensive analysis (multiyear financial projections, financial risk, building operations impact, personnel impact, transportation impact, possible Grades 1 through 12 impact, etc.), or whether it was a series of disjointed topic descriptions that were only comprehensible to someone reading between the lines of the compendium.

But, whatever Dr. Cancroft provided to Mr. Cenerelli, it was clear that the Board President, as well as several members of the BOE, felt that they had not received the information which they had instructed the Superintendent to provide.

In the end, several Trustees did decide to vote to approve the Proposed Budget, including the incorporation of an FDK program for Elwood, but they seemed to do so primarily because they were placing their faith in Dr. Cancroft, and not because of what they had received from Mr. Cenerelli.

In the case of Trustee Kaplan and Trustee Matos, each of them seemed to have some satisfaction from material that they had been able to develop outside the direct channel of the Superintendent-to-BOE President providing to the BOE what he had been instructed to provide, perhaps allowing that to be used as a refining supplement to information which they received from the Superintendent. But they, along with other trustees, seemed far from satisfied with the information received to date.

Mr. Ciccone was the one approving trustee who made very clear that there were remaining concerns about FDK structural integrity and minimal impact on other grades, and who also made very clear that the BOE is not only relying upon upon Dr. Cancroft to make this program successful, but to make it succeed without anyone asking the BOE for additional financial support for FDK in future years.

It was also noted by Mr. Ciccone that there were open questions about how the FDK plan will require adjusting the school day hours at the Middle School, as well as at Harley, and that there were open questions about the impact on AIS instruction.

Mr. Ciccone also made note of the fact that there has never been a true analysis of the alternative FDK model which he had proposed, involving 3 full Harley days and two reduced Harley days, in contrast to the proposed model of five 5 1/2 hour FDK days, which includes 25 instruction hours.

There have been some misguided remarks from the District Administration about the SED not permitting an arrangement such as Mr. Ciccone had proposed, when anyone who reads the actual SED regulation (as I did) clearly sees the language which would permit Mr. Ciccone’s concept, which also has 25 hours of instruction each week, as long as the SED approves it in advance.

The per-annum cost to taxpayers, by the way, after some very diligent work by the BOE, and by the District Administration in response to the BOE, was reduced to only $25,000 in Year One, and $25,000 in Year Two, and about $40,000 in Year Three. Mr. Ciccone believes that his alternative structure could lower the costs further, but that has yet to be demonstrated.

Therefore, for less than $100,000 of net additional costs over the next three years, the Elwood community will have a new and attractive program that could bring other families, with very young children, to consider purchasing a home in Elwood instead of in some of the surrounding communities. That could have some positive implications for the pricing of home resale's in the Elwood community, although some real estate professionals discount that factor.

In any event we are going forward on an FDK program for Elwood with the following predications and provisos:

(1) The viability of Elwood’s FDK program will depend upon Harley Principal Dr. Cancroft making the program work, as she believes that she has demonstrated that viability to the Superintendent of Schools;

(2) Neither Dr. Cancroft, nor the District Administration, should request additional funding for FDK from the BOE and Elwood’s taxpayers;

(3) Any adjustments for unanticipated costs of FDK, therefore, will have to come from within the FDK program itself, rather than from other District resources;

(4) Dr. Cancroft and the District Administration will be expected to minimize any impact upon Grades 1 through 12 as a result of the implementation of the FDK program.

This entire process has provided more evidence, as if it were needed after last year’s FDK proposal debacle, that Elwood’s District Administration, in future years, will be held to higher standards of due diligence, and full compliance with all governance requirements as indicated under State laws and SED regulations.

Surely, we can do better than we have done with this FDK proposal.