MS Question

[Josh Hannah]

I don't want to belabor the MS Closing question, but I think it's useful to figure out if it's on the table or not.  I sent out the request if anybody had a reason that pierced the logic that had been put forth that says "it wouldn't help" and Mike has replied, so I want to diagram this.

For full disclosure, my kids are 3 and 1 -- I have no vested interest in keeping the MS open, and if acting in my enlightened self interest would support measures that opened up more K slots above all else.

To recap the previous argument:
* Closing MS would open 2 classrooms and 1 lab
* You could fill those rooms for 2 (possibly but unlikely 3) years but then you'd have a bunch of 1st graders with nowhere to go to second
*  No room to build, hence closing MS does not help make room for more K on an ongoing basis.

Let me try to distill Mike's comments (apologies Mike and correct me if I oversimplify):

These two I agree with but I don't think address the above logic:
*  drawing a new dividing line does bad things for the neighborhood
*  it's more valuable to fill K-5 slots than it is to put HC kids into that MS

This seems to cut to the core (verbatim):
* "The argument that closing the MS will not free up any space is non-
sense.  If you take 40 kids out of the system, that makes room for 40
more.  Yes, there may be a transitioning period to get the balance
throughout the school right again, and it make take a few years to
settle out - but 40 out, 40 in (spread across 6 grades in a K-5 model
that's almost 7 new kid a year)."
*  Principal of HC can find some way to use these 2.5 classrooms to fit more K-5 kids

This argument I find really interesting and would like to see discussed, but I'm not sure it impacts whether we keep "closing the MS" on the table:
*  Demographic problem is accelerating
*  Need to find a long-term solution
*  Maybe we should think blank-sheet -- a complete HC rebuild?  Maybe patching and patching is never going to solve the problem


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My thoughts:

I don't know other reactions but to me it's hard to put closing the MS back on the table.  The arguments others have made seemed to refute the main core point.  Mike says that if we pull out 40 MS kids, we can put in 40 K kids, but how can that be without reconstructing the school?  It seems to me the physical plant doesn't support that.  Unless somebody can put a concrete plan on the table -- be in the Principal, someone who talks to the Principal, or just someone who knows more than I do -- given legal class size limits and the classroom configuration, how could it be?  Grades K-2, each with 7 students, in one classroom, and grades 3-5, each with seven students, in another? 

Sorry be be pedantic.  I just don't see how our reps can advocate anything on our behalf if we don't narrow the option set.  And given diverse views, I don't see how we can ever expect to agree on the possible options -- i.e. if a line is drawn, where should it be drawn?  So it seems to me the only obvious progress is to at least take objectively impossible options off the table.

(or if people don't find this useful I'm happy to be quiet!)

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As a final point, I personally think Mike's clean-sheet suggestion is really interesting.  I find myself being unwillingly pushed towards private school -- far enough south that I'm almost certainly drawn out in any new drawing of the boundaries, and Thornhill and Montclair seem more remote with each email I read from the committee... would I rather put $20K-$30K (more?) a year between the two kids into rebuilding Hillcrest?  No doubt.  Possibly some of my elderly neighbors would be less enthusiastic I suppose.