Teachers, Parents Worried About Fox Lane Middle School Reductions
Fox Lane Middle School teachers and parents recently registered their disenchantment with Bedford school officials for opting for a two-house model in eighth grade next year because the district needed to close a $6.7 million budget gap.
Superintendent of Schools Dr. Robert Glass said the district’s loss of federal money from the pandemic was the main reason why the administration proposed going from three to two houses for eighth-graders in the 2023-24 school year. As a result, the average class size in eighth grade is expected to rise to 25 students. The average will remain under 20 for sixth and seventh grade, he said.
Glass said he was faced with exceeding the tax cap by $6,648,350 in this year’s $152.5 million budget that was approved by the Board of Education on Apr. 12. Reductions totaling $3,681,350 and use of more than $2.9 million from the district’s reserves helped balance the budget without exceeding the cap on the tax levy, which his 2.47 percent.
Three positions each were cut at the middle school and at the elementary school level, spots that were created to reduce class size to help students navigate the return to in-person learning during the pandemic. Glass said the positions had been looked upon as temporary when the district received the federal COVID dollars.
Furthermore, district enrollment is expected to continue declining. In 2016, Bedford’s enrollment was 4,378 students; for the upcoming school year it is projected at 3,534.
“They’re sitting now in the 16, 17, 18 (student) range,” the superintendent said of this year’s class sizes. “So this was a decision about how do we keep it as close as we can (to that) and how do we empower the principal and her team to figure out the best way.”
Parents and teachers of middle school students had pointed comments for Glass and the board before the budget was adopted. Mount Kisco resident Diana Goldberg, a teacher in another district and the mother of two children, the oldest entering the middle school next year, said the two-house model threatens to eliminate gains that were made since the return to in-person school.
With the average eighth-grade class at 25 students next year, there could be some sections with as many as 28 pupils, she said.
“The house structure and the supports that it provides students is essential to the success of any middle school program,” Goldberg said. “Without it, we are returning to the decades-old, outdated junior high model, which does not meet the needs of early adolescents.”
Current seventh-grade teacher Matt Lepre said smaller class size in the current team concept is about more than just enhancing academic achievement. It helps with students’ well-being at a difficult age for many youngsters.
“The team is the first line of defense and early warning system for every hardship and every challenge your kids have at school, whether their challenges are academic, social, emotional or otherwise, their teachers are the emergency response team,” Lepre said.
Board President Edward Reder clarified some public comments saying that the school’s model remains the same, with the exception of eighth grade.
“We’re not taking away a team or a house, we’re taking a house in eighth grade, but the team model still exists in those two houses,” Reder said.
Glass added that the two-house model has been used before by the district, particularly in the years following the difficult 2015-16 budget deliberations that forced Bedford to cut more than 50 positions at the time.
But middle school social studies teacher Rosa Hirsch said that many students and the district are faced with greater challenges today.
“The needs of our students have grown much more intense since the last time we were two houses,” Hirsch said. “We have a much higher percentage of (English Language Learners). We have a much higher percentage of students receiving special ed services who are included in special ed classrooms. When we were a two-house school, that was not the case. As a result of COVID, the emotional, social needs are much more intense.”
Reder and other board members said they would like to evaluate the structure of the teams and houses so the district can have a consistent and stable model that isn’t subject to the unpredictability of a single budget cycle.
If approved by voters on Tuesday, May 16, Bedford and Pound Ridge property owners would see a tax rate increase of more than 5 percent, while the district’s Mount Kisco taxpayers would have an 8.36 percent decline. District residents in New Castle and North Castle would see tax rate reductions of 0.2 and 0.41 percent, respectively.
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