Franklin Square school district: middle school?

At last week’s Franklin Square Union Free School District’s Board of Education meeting, Patrick Manley, the district’s superintendent, presented a proposal to save an estimated $1.28 million for the district, and implement important programs into its schools’ curriculum. The proposal would reconfigure the district’s three schools — the Washington Street, Polk Street and John Street schools — and create a district middle school.

Currently, each of the district’s schools houses Kindergarten to sixth-grade students, and the proposal would gradually re-allocate students so that the Polk Street and John Street schools would house Kindergarten to fourth-grade students, and the Washington Street School would house only fifth- and sixth-graders. Manley said the idea to re-allocate students within the three schools was first brought up nearly three years ago when the district commissioned a reconfiguration study, but the public generally opposed the idea due to a strong sense of community with their separate schools.

Manley said it wasn’t aboslutely necessary for the district to consider reconfiguration three years ago, but now it is. The 2 percent property tax cap proposed by Gov. Andrew Cuomo in January — passed by the Senate in February, and awaiting the Assembly’s approval — and a longtime desire to bring pre-Kindergarten and foreign language programs into the district caused the proposal’s introduction. “It’s going to be impossible to continue to enhance our programs with the property tax cap,” Manley said.

Manley said the district’s “Excellence, Equity and Economics” proposal, if approved, would save money by promoting management efficiency, and gradually reducing the number of employees in the district. The employee reduction would correlate with retirement, he added. “I’m trying not to unemploy people,” he said.

The proposal would even out class sizes and would take place over the next four years, with one grade level being transitioned each year, he added.