Is The Lakewood BOE Commited To Full Day Kindergarten?

The following is the printed text of my question to the School Board at their regular meeting on Monday night, July 12, during the Communication period.

Question for the Lakewood BOE and District:

Please bear with me tonight as the issue I wish to question you on is complex. This is regarding an emergency resolution that three members of the Board voted on during the July 1st Board meeting. The resolution states:

“WHEREAS, The Lakewood Board of Education recognizes that providing all-day, every-day kindergarten presents a hardship to the school district and is seeking a waiver for the delay of implementation; and,

WHEREAS, the Lakewood Board of Education understands that the waiver is for the delay of all-day, every-day kindergarten for the 2010-2011 school year; and,

WHEREAS, the Lakewood Board of Education acknowledges that the Superintendent may seek a waiver with board approval by submitting the board adopted resolution for delay, the justification for the waiver and a plan for implementation for providing all-day, every-day kindergarten beginning in 2011-2012 school year; and,

WHEREAS, on July 1, 2010 the Lakewood Board of Education recommends and grants permission to the Superintendent to seek a waiver.

BE IT RESOLVED that the Lakewood Board of Education recommends that the Superintendent seek a waiver for the delay of all-day, every-day kindergarten for the 2010-2011 school year.”

The question is: Does the district intend to offer full-day kindergarten for the 2010-2011 school year despite the wording of the waiver? Does the district intend to offer full-day kindergarten for the 2011-2012 school year? Where does the Board stand on its commitment to this program?

Now I understand this is a sophisticated issue that has many different facets, so let me see if I truly understand. During the 7:15 am meeting on July 1st Ms. Soeder explained how the seeking of this waiver is essentially a shell-game. This waiver is merely a formality to free up funding for all-day kindergarten, which is exactly the opposite of what the Resolution, asking for this waiver states.

In the Sun Post article regarding this very same issue it states that:

“At a special meeting Thursday, school board members voted 2-1 to ask the State for a waiver to release federal grants from last school year to pay for the extended kindergarten program for 2010-11. Board member Matthew Markling opposed the resolution; two other members were absent.”

I fail to see anywhere in the actual resolution where it states that the waiver is to release federal grants from the last school year to pay for all-day kindergarten. Perhaps that is part of the "shell game" I was referring to. I don’t know.

The other problem is that at the same July 1st meeting, the administration, under the direction of Dr. Madak, guaranteed that all-day kindergarten would indeed be offered for the 2010-2011 school year. But when Board members Shaughnessy and Beebe were pressed to give that same guarantee, they refused.

This leads one to wonder what exactly the school board intends to do.

Now for my own reasons I do not trust resolutions that are “just formalities,” or “procedural.” Back before the Phase III process officially began, a resolution was signed by the Board stating that Grant Elementary School would be demolished. At that time we were all told that it was merely a formality, in fact that it was “procedural” and that a name had to be put in there, and that Grant school was randomly chosen, instead of something that would be more accurate, like, “To be determined.”

I trusted the Board, but after months of wasted time that was exactly what the Board voted to do.

So now we are being told that this waiver is merely a formality and that it doesn’t mean what it states. I personally don’t want to fall for this again.

Lastly, I am concerned that the District is going to the state of Ohio making the claim that we don’t have the funds to offer all-day kindergarten, a program that we, as voters, were led to believe would be funded by the operating levy we just passed in May. In fact, members of the Levy committee used preserving All-Day Kindergarten as one of the reasons we had to pass the levy. Well we passed it.

How will the district explain to the state of Ohio that even though the voters passed an operating levy we don’t have the funds to offer a program we’ve been offering, that’s already in our budget? Especially when, as Dr. Madak promised, we actually DO offer it in the Fall? If we do.

How does the District explain this to the voters of Lakewood?

In laymen’s terms, are we having all-day Kindergarten this Fall? Are we having all-day Kindergarten in the 2011-2012 school year? A simple yes or no would be appreciated. And then the reasons for that decision.

Thank you. I would like a copy of this to be entered into the official record, I have one here.

Joe Madak addressed my questions first.

He said that there is no question in his mind whether all-day kindergarten would be offered this Fall. It will definitely be offered this Fall. He said that the idea that it might not be was a misunderstanding regarding funding.

He went on to say that providing for all-day kindergarten out of the general fund would require that class sizes be 35 per class or upwards, which would be a hardship for the District. This is why they are classifying this as a “hardship” and this is why the District is trying to finance it creatively. The waiver, declaring hardship, will enable them to free up 300 to 400 thousand dollars of unused Title funds from last year to pay for this year’s all day Kindergarten. Everything they are doing is within the law. He said that it is unclear when we will know the status of the waiver, as the filing deadline was June 30th, and the Board didn’t meet until July 1st.

From this statement it appears that at least Dr. Madak is very familiar with exactly how much money we have, and exactly what programs we will be funding. If he can say categorically, that providing for all-day kindergarten out of the general fund would require larger class sizes, it implies that cutting is already down to the bone.

This further implies that the District knows exactly what programming they are offering in the Fall.

Board member Matt Markling said he voted “no” at that July 1st meeting because it was his understanding that there was not a consensus among Board members as to whether all-day kindergarten would be offered this Fall or not, and they were unwilling to provide a guarantee. There is no videotaped record of this meeting, and an explanation as to why there was none was not given.

Clearly this Board’s problems with transparency are not only with the general public but amongst themselves.

Dr. Madak does not appear to feel this way, as he summed up by saying, “It mystifies me why this was an issue at all.”

I responded that this is was an issue because the resolution lacks any wording regarding this being a funding issue. Instead it says that this is a waiver to enable the District to NOT OFFER THE PROGRAM.

While I am reassured by Dr. Madak’s adamant statements, I wonder whether I have come any further in the matter of how the Board communicates issues with the general public or even with each other. They did not address the issue of how there could have been such confusion between and within the District and the Board itself. Of course we in the general public are confused.

My next question will be exactly what programming is being offered, and where the programming cuts are. What are we keeping, what are we losing and when will they make this public so that parents can prepare for the upcoming school year?

Trust remains an issue. We still have out there a resolution which states that we want a waiver making it okay NOT to offer all-day kindergarten. My fear over the last resolution that was supposed to be merely procedural proved, in the end, to be exactly what it was. This situation has never been addressed or even acknowledged.

The only way this entire issue can be resolved is that the Board become transparent regarding where the District is and where it’s going. With facts and figures and full communication of where we are headed, and WHY, to the best of their ability in these uncertain economic times.

Right now we know the answers to neither of these questions, but we do know that the District is offering all-day Kindergarten this Fall.