Around Town

School Officials Have New Plan for Addressing Overcrowding Next Fall

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After hearing the concerns of parents about a proposal to move preschool, Pre-K and even kindergarten classes around the district, Watertown School officials presented a second plan, which got better – but still mixed – reviews at a packed meeting at Watertown High School Monday night. The new plan calls for moving one Early Steps Integrated Preschool class from Hosmer Elementary School to the Phillips Building (an old school on Common Street) which along with another Early Steps class already slated to be at the Phillips. In addition, one PreK class each from Cunniff, Lowell and Hosmer elementary schools would move to the Phillips, too, Superintendent Jean Fitzgerald said. The first proposal was more complicated, and called for more moves, including moving all the Early Steps classes from the Hosmer to the Phillips, and moving Pre-K classes from the Lowell and the Cunniff. It also proposed moving a Cunniff kindergarten over to the Hosmer, and later a second Cunniff kindergarten was proposed to move, too.

Letters

LETTER: Parents Group Reacts to District’s Plans to Stop Overcrowding

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These are the “Unofficial Minutes” of the Buildings & Grounds Subcommittee Meeting on May 16 provided by Watertown Strong Schools, a parents group that follows the Watertown Public School. These Minutes were written by Alyson Morales. Note: These are NOT official minutes. Commentary can be found at the end of the minutes. Committee members: Liz Yusem, Chair; Kendra Foley; Eileen Hsu-Balzer; Dr. Fitzgerald; Charles Kellner, Director of Business Services; Stephen Romanelli, Director of Facilities & Transportation. Audience members: John Portz (SC), Guido Guidotti (SC), Candace Miller (SC), Mena Ciarlone (Cunniff Principal), Elizabeth Kaplan (Lowell Principal), Robert LaRoche (Hosmer Principal), Aaron Dushku (TC), Lisa Feltner (TC), Vinnie Piccirili (TC), Steve Magoon (Assistant Town Manager/Director of Community Development & Planning), Brandt Brisson (WSS), James Cairns (WSS), Peter Caron (WSS), Kate Coyne (WSS), Rebecca Grow (WSS), Margo Guernsey (WSS), Mohammad Sibai (WSS), David Stokes (WSS), Alyson Morales (WSS), Mike Shepard, and others.

Overcrowding

School Officials Planning to Use Phillips School to Stop Overcrowding

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Monday night, Superintendent Jean Fitzgerald shared a plan to renovate rooms at the Phillips School to move pre-school classes to free up spaces at an elementary school to relieve the enrollment pressures at all three elementary schools. The shuffling of plans is a complicated one, Fitzgerald explained at the School Committee Building and Grounds Subcommittee meeting. It begins with the Early Steps Preschool program from Hosmer School to the Phillips Building. Three classes will go into a renovated maintenance area on the first floor
one class will go into a room used as a conference room by the Watertown Public Schools
a full-day preschool class and a Connections class (which includes mainstream and  special needs students) will use two classrooms that had been used by the Growing Places preschool before it moved out

The rooms at Hosmer that had been used for the preschool will house four classes, including some from other schools:

a Lowell Pre-K class,
a Cunniff Pre-K class
a Cunniff kindergarten
a Hosmer English Language Learner (ELL) class
one extra room at Hosmer will remain and could take another room if enrollment keeps growing

Meanwhile, the spaces freed up at the elementary schools will allow for additional classes. the Lowell Pre-K room will become a new first grade classroom
the Cunniff Pre-K room will become a special education classroom
the Cunniff kindergarten room will become a new third grade classroom
the Hosmer ELL room will become a new fourth grade classroom

Fitzgerald said she would rather spend money on property the district owned, rather than renting space or modular classrooms. She added that she expects the Phillips School – which has two more floors – to become a school down the line as the district grows.

Schools

Options to Reduce Overcrowding Discussed, Modulars Won’t be Ready By Sept.

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The overcrowding in Watertown’s elementary schools tops the list of School Committee concerns these days, and Monday night Superintendent Jean Fitzgerald warned modular classrooms – if that is the solution – won’t be in place for the beginning of school. There are several options being explored, but Fitzgerald said the final plan won’t be made until all the factors are weighed, including enrollment, space at each school and new spaces, including potential rental spaces or installing modular classrooms.

The School District has hired an enrollment consultant – Decision Insite – to get a detailed enrollment projection, and it has began working with the town’s on-call architect on ways to reconfigure space and to find potential sites for modular classrooms.

The latest enrollment projection for the fall (which does not include information from the consultant) includes three classes of 24 in the third grade at Lowell Elementary School. “That’s not OK with us,” Fitzgerald said. One option which Fitzgerald said she thinks would be unpopular would be to change the schools from neighborhood ones to having all of one grade at one school. One would be Pre-K to 1, another grades 2-3 and fourth and fifth grade at the third school.

Letters

LETTER: Watertown Parents Group Wants Solution to Overcrowded Schools, Soon

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For the past several years, the growing student enrollment numbers in Watertown, particularly at the elementary level, along with the demands of good quality 21st Century general and special education, have placed increasing space pressures on our school buildings.  We have reached a point where our three elementary schools are out of space. Addressing these space issues has been on the back burner for far too long; we need to make major progress in the near term. To date, we have placed the responsibility for managing these space constraints and for maintaining safe and effective learning environments on the school principals and faculty.  They have done and continue to do a tremendous job – showing remarkable flexibility, creativity, and care to try and give all students a positive educational experience. We have reached a point where the physical space limits exceed their ability to solve the problem in both the immediate and longer term at the school level. There are several classes in each Elementary school that are projected to be above Watertown’s unofficial class size guidelines (18-24 students depending on grade level) next year, and quite a few that are right on the cusp of turning into a situation like what the Cunniff is facing right now.

Letters

See Watertown Strong Schools’ ‘Unofficial Minutes’ on Overcrowding, Other Issues

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This is the first publication of the “Unofficial Minutes” created by Watertown Strong Schools. The group of concerned parents who follow the Watertown Public Schools attend meetings and write-up summaries, and at the end, provide their commentary on the issues of the night. 
Unofficial Minutes: Buildings & Grounds Subcommittee Meeting on 4/11/16 – Key Points and Commentary
Note: These are NOT official minutes. Subcommittee members: Jean Fitzgerald, Superintendent; Charles Kellner, Director of Business Services; Liz Yusem, Chair; Kendra Foley, Eileen Hsu-Balzer

Audience members: John Portz (SC), Candace Miller (SC), Guido Guidotti (SC), Mark Sideris (TC/SC), Vincent Piccirilli (TC), Aaron Dushku (TC), Michael Dattoli (TC), Lisa Feltner (TC), Tom Tracy (Auditor/Assistant Town Manager for Finance), Stephen Romanelli, Director of Facilities and Transportation, Brandt Brisson (WSS), James Cairns (WSS), Kate Coyne (WSS), Angelo DeFrancesco (WSS), Margo Guernesey (WSS), Diego Hammerschlag (WSS), Chris Lowry (WSS), David Stokes (WSS), Alyson Morales (WSS), Bob LaRoche, Hosmer Principal, Mena Ciarlone, Cunniff Principal, Robert Varnum, Lisa Hayward, Bruce Colton, Elaina Griffith, Mike Shepard, and others. Approximately 40 people were in attendance. Plaque Honoring Mr. John R. Burns

2 former students representing a much larger group came from NYC so that they could ask to place a plaque in the Middle School (to be chosen by WPS) honoring Mr. John R. Burns, a former Watertown Middle School teacher and principal, who passed away in October 2015.

Cunniff School

Schools Looking at Modular Classrooms, Crowding Still Concerns Parents

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School officials do not yet have a concrete plan for dealing with overcrowded classrooms in Watertown next fall, but modular classrooms could be part of the solution. Meanwhile, parents continue to worry about large class sizes or classes being taught in unorthodox spaces. Monday night, the School Committee’s Building and Grounds Subcommittee discussed the short and long term solutions to the space problem in Watertown’s schools at the meeting at the Watertown High School Library. Superintendent Jean Fitzgerald said, looking at the current projections, the schools would be OK, and classes in the three elementary schools would not be overcrowded. The biggest class would be one at Hosmer Elementary School with 24 students.

Schools

School Budget Has Funds for Elementary Foreign Language Classes, None for Shrinking Class Sizes

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The budget presented to the Watertown School Committee Monday night calls for adding more than 20 new positions, including staff to start teaching foreign language at the elementary schools, but it did not have any funds to reduce class sizes in the elementary schools. The total request for Fiscal Year 2017 to the Town Manager and Town Council is $44.149 million, an increase of $2.69 million over the Fiscal 2016 request (the current school year). That is a 6.51 percent increase. The Foreign Language in the Elementary School, or FLES, program is one of the biggest additions. Superintendent Jean Fitzgerald said the district would hire three teachers to begin teaching kindergartners a foreign language (likely Spanish).