Schools will house entire grade levels from district beginning next year
By Michael S. Hoey
Correspondent
After two years of discussions, the Delavan-Darien school board decided Monday on a 4-3 vote to implement the center-school model for the 2016-17 school year.
“This is the biggest thing the district has done in a while,” President Jeff Scherer said. “I think it was the right thing to do, but only time will tell.”
The meeting in the nearly full auditorium of Phoenix Middle School began with about 50 minutes of public comments during which 15 people spoke. Nine were opposed to the center school model and six supported it. Two petitions were presented, one with about 100 signatures in support and another with just more than 200 against the model.
The concerns about the model were similar to ones presented at previous board meetings. Residents Tina Lockhart, Kristen Andreoni, and Tiffany Schot presented two new concerns. Lockhart expressed concern about class time lost to fourth- and fifth-graders due to an increased time spent on shuttle buses. Andreoni and Schott asked for committees to be formed to study the center-school model more before implementing it. Some other speakers agreed with that idea as well.
Scherer said the district has been considering the model for two years. Crist said he did not disagree with what any of the residents said, it was just a different perspective.
After the public comments, Director of Instruction Deborah Erdmann and Director of Special Education and Pupil Services Sara Halberg listed the benefits of the center-schools model, which include cost savings to the district, a more efficient use of district resources and a better quality education.
Halberg said the model will help better integrate the three elementary schools. Turtle Creek Elementary has 52 students with individualized education plans while Darien has 20 and Wileman has 12. Halberg also said the district has more than 100 homeless students, many of whom are forced to transfer to one or even two new schools during a single school year because of their circumstances. She said 60 students have transferred so far this year, and the new model would have kept them in the same school with the same teacher.
Most of the board members explained their positions before voting. Scherer, Steve Logterman and Roxann Kelton supported the model. Jim Hansen and Sharon Gonzalez supported the model but opposed implementing it for the 2016-17 school year. Hansen said he wanted to be sure all the public’s questions are answered, and Gonzalez did not want to approve the plan only to watch it fail without an effective implementation. John Andreoni said he wanted more information about the model and could not in good conscience support something that has not been looked at well enough.
“I understand why they were being overly cautious,” Crist said after the meeting. “But I don’t think it (the timing) is a big deal.”
Crist said waiting a year would actually cost the district money and uproot families as some discussion was had about changing school boundaries and moving some programs out of Turtle Creek as the district considered a full commitment to the center-schools model.
In the end, Scherer, Logterman, Kelton and Chad Kort voted in favor of implementing the model for next year while Hansen, Gonzalez and Andreoni voted not to.
Crist said the vote will allow the district to address the issues related to integration, special needs and homeless students better than it can now and it will allow the district to fund some ideas for gifted-and-talented students and address salary issues. He said money saved would be reallocated to other needs.
