The following letter is also attached as a MS Word Document: Considerations in Closing Schools February 6, 2002
First I must say how sorry I am to have to take the position I am
taking. It is very difficult for me to have to advocate a course of action
that some consider harmful to their children. But one of my primary
responsibilities as a member of the School Board is to provide the best
education possible to all of our students in the long term, with the
funding available. As much as I would love to provide everything for
everyone, I cannot provide an expensive, non-essential benefit to a small
group of people, when it comes at a significant, long term cost to all the
students of the District.
In spite of over $2 million worth of cuts in programs and staffing in the
last two years, and the recently passed referendum, we continue to be in a
financial and educational crisis. Those staffing cuts have resulted in
many of our classes being way oversize. Some elementary classes are close
to 30, and many high school classes are close to 40. That puts a huge load
on the teachers, and there is no way they can provide an optimum education
under those conditions. When the referendum dollars start coming in, they
will just get us back out of the Statutory Operating Debt that we expect to
enter this next year. In the next five years, we can look to budget
reductions of $3-4 million more. Given the current economy and both state
and federal budget problems, the very best we can hope for is that our
current funding won't be cut even further. Maybe it won't be quite that
bad, but it could be even worse.
For the most part, this situation has been beyond our control. We have
enhanced our revenue and reduced our expenses just about as much as we can,
with one glaring exception: building capacity. The fact is, we have a huge
excess capacity in our elementary school buildings. Our current elementary
capacity is 2,300 students. Our current elementary population is
1,650. Our elementary population in the 06-07 school year will be 1,350.
I do appreciate the value of small neighborhood schools, but their small
overall population and uneven distribution among grades make them very
inefficient and costly. At this time they are a luxury that we simply
cannot afford. Closing one small elementary building would save us
approximately $250,000 per year in building maintenance and support staff
costs. The teachers, for the most part, would follow the students to other
buildings, and because of increased efficiency, we could actually see
reductions in class sizes.
Some parents of "small" school students have expressed fear that their
children would be lost and overwhelmed in a "big" school. Please realize
that Jefferson and W-K are not "big" schools. By most standards they would
be considered small to medium. The education that our students receive in
them is in no way inferior to any other in the district. The staff,
students and parents in them are just as dedicated, passionate, and
friendly as in any other. What is far more important is how many students
are in each classroom; not how many are in the building.
Numerous suggestions have been made in hopes of providing options that
might allow us to avoid closing elementary buildings. Many are excellent
ideas and we will need to implement anything that will save us money or
provide additional income. But in the final analysis, fund-raising,
renting out empty classrooms as office space, and shuffling other programs
around just won't be near enough. Some proposals entail such serious
drawbacks as to make them costly and/or counter productive.
The Lincoln building continues to be a popular target, but there would be
some serious ramifications to closing it. The needs of our Early Childhood
and Community Ed programs are quite different from the needs of our
Elementary programs. Lincoln is located and has been configured to meet
those needs very well. There is no other building in the district that
comes close to being as suitable. Major moving costs and remodeling
required in other buildings to meet those needs would result in little cost
benefit. The decentralization and fracturing of the programs would result
in serious degradation of services now provided to the 400 adults and
students at their current location.
On the other hand, if we could move administration out of the 25% of
Lincoln that they occupy, other "Community Ed" type satellite programs
could be brought in from leased and other areas, increasing
efficiency. And the entire cost of the building would be paid for out of
Community Ed funds, which are fairly solvent. It would be operated at no
cost to the General Fund, which is where we experiencing all of our
problems. We do need to look at that.
If we take decisive action to reduce our expenditures now, we can keep our
heads above water and weather these difficult times. However, the longer
we delay, the deeper we will go and the more drastic and painful action
that will be needed to get us out. If we fail to make the necessary cuts,
the state will ultimately come in and make them for us. I would not expect
them to be kind, gentle, or considerate in doing that. At that point, the
best we will be able to do is point a finger of blame at them and claim
that it's not our fault. But that won't lessen the pain or reduce the
damage to our kids one iota.
So, once again, we have two choices:
1. We can close at least one small school now. This may cause some
students and parents some degree of discomfort now, but along with other
measures, will insure that we continue to provide all of our children with
a sound education. It will cause no catastrophic harm.
2. We can keep all of our Elementary schools open and hope
that fund raising and cut backs in less popular areas will come close to
compensating for the high cost. If not, we can expect to see even larger
class sizes and more program cuts throughout the district. And in all
likelihood those schools will ultimately be closed anyway.
I am all for being optimistic and innovative, but we must also be
realistic. Closing a school is not a popular choice, but I believe it is
the right choice. Until some one shows me something better I will stand by it.
Sincerely,
Fred Petersen
Winona School Board
Fred & Alisa Petersen
RR 1 Box 114
Winona, MN 55987
507/689-2657
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Considerations in Closing Schools.doc
Description: MS-Word document
