By ARIELLA MONTI and JOSEPH KELLARD
The group formed last year, after the Board of Education announced plans to possibly phase out East School. “There was obviously some concern based on the statements made by the board,” said East School PTA Co-President Jackie Miller. The board had explained that the district was continuing to see steadily declining enrollment, and proposed closing the aging East School and send its students to the other elementary schools in town. But in January, after East School parents asked the board to take a wait-and-see approach to the district’s demographics and enrollment, President Pat Gallagher announced that the board would table its decision on the fate of the school until 2011.
Its reasoning was detailed in the spring 2009 issue of Connections, the district newsletter, which read, in part, “While East School had been considered for closing in the near term, the board rescinded this consideration in early January to analyze further the enrollment trends supported in the demographic studies.”
Jodi Gusler, a member of Friends of East School as well as the Blackheath and East School PTA, said that the board publicized phasing out the 82-year-old building, but once it made the decision to keep the school open for two more years, the news was not made as widely available as she would have liked.
“There are people who have said they felt East School was closing, so why are they going to send their child there?” Gusler said of parents now considering where to enroll their kindergarten-aged children.
Amanda Tolmach-Schnur, who has a daughter in Blackheath, said that if parents are hearing rumors in the East community that the school will close, it made sense that they would think twice about sending their child there. Tolmach-Schnur said she wasn’t considering sending her daughter to East School, though her decision had nothing to do with the controversy. “From what I’ve heard, [the school will close] in three years,” she said. “Why would you then send them just to get sent to another school?”
At Tuesday night’s school board meeting, parent Colleen O’Neill charged board trustees and administrators with spreading information that is leading parents to consider enrolling their children at elementary school other than East School. “The damage is already done, so who’s going to come now?” O’Neill asked the board. “The East School community are working our butts off because of your guys’ bad publicity.”
Superintendent Dr. Robert Greenberg dismissed any suggestions that the district has been acting against East School. “There has been no cabal to try to keep the numbers down at East School,” Greenberg said. “ … There were no devious, behind-the-scenes requests.”
O’Neill said that while East School has had just two kindergarten classes for the past two years, other elementary schools, such as West School, have three or more when their enrollment numbers don’t warrant them. “If we had three kindergarten classes, that would do wonders for the school,” she said.
Greenberg explained that Lido School has four kindergarten classes because of its dual-language program, and he vowed to check the enrollment numbers more carefully. “I will go over every one of the requests, and if parents request East School, I will absolutely honor them,” he said. “...We are committed to East School as a viable school to send your children.”
Some parents mentioned the recent reports that there were more babies born in the U.S. in 2007 than any other year in the country’s history. “If enrollment trends change we may need to keep a fourth school,” said board trustee Frank Alvarado.
On Tuesday the board also voted to put a $98.9 million bond on the May 19 ballot. The bond would finance the first phase of the district’s preservation plan to upgrade its schools and facilities. About $3.5 million would be earmarked for upgrading and maintaining the East School building.
The board also announced that its final budget would be unveiled at its April 7 meeting. Comments about this story? JKellard@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 213.
