“This is really about getting the communities input,” said Valley View board of education president Jenny Michael at the Oct. 17 meeting.
The plan is being considered for a number of reasons: all day kindergarten was mandated for the 2011-12 school year (recently the state is allowing for waivers), improved teacher collaboration by bringing like grades together in a single building, improving teacher-pupil ratios and other considerations.
Voters earlier defeated a levy which would have built new schools in the district. Michael said the reconfiguration proposal was a way to “work with the space we’ve got.”
Michael said “a long list” of considerations have to be made when reviewing reconfiguration ideas. They include transportation costs, cafeteria/food service issues, handicap accessibility and even the cost of moving equipment.
The strategy being considered is to reconfigure the district’s kindergarten through eighth-grade students into three schools. The high school is not affected by the plan.
School officials say the plan would create “a positive learning environment where both teachers and students can flourish, while requiring no construction or renovation of the buildings and pursuing as much cost savings as possible.”
They also said no teacher or administrator would lose a job if the plan is implemented.
Four proposals were made. but an “A” plan was selected as the best. It would make a
• Valley View Primary School (kindergarten through third grade) at what is now Germantown Elementary School and part of the west wing of the current Middle School.
• Valley View Intermediate School (fourth through sixth grade) at what is now the Middle School
• Valley View Jr. High (grades seven and eight) at what is now Farmersville Elementary.
The plan is expected to save transportation costs.
If the reconfiguration plan is approved by the board — not before the first quarter of next year — it would be implemented for the 2011-12 school year. Moving would be done next summer.
Separate PTO’s would have to be “blended” but Michael said she didn’t see that as a problem. “I think of this as one district, one Valley View,” she said. Valley View encompasses both Germantown, Farmersville and surrounding townships.
During the meeting, various concerns were voiced. Transportation issues such as traffic jams on Comstock, athletics, and how music classes and science labs would be handled were discussed. A transportation cost analysis is being reviewed again.
One audience member said she thought the issue should be voted upon by the community. Michael said this wasn’t a ballot issue, that local voters were, in fact, “voting” when they returned a survey.
Michael summed up the proposal. “It’s about facilitating the education of our students at Valley View,” she said.
Contact this writer at (937) 696-2080 or williamgschmidt@ frontier.com.
About the Author