During the ConVal School Board meeting Tuesday night, Dublin resident and parent John Wood said that he was concerned the school district has not provided enough data for voters to be able to make an informed decision on reconfiguration.

“I understand the school board has attempted to do consolidation in the past and that it failed. I  urge you to take your time, to provide the detail and the data to us – who are responsible for voting for this – making sure we have all the relevant details. What schools have extra space? What schools don’t have extra space? What student-to-teacher ratio are we supposed to have? What is the expected student-to-teacher ratio? None of this information has been provided up to this point,” Wood said.

The School Board reviewed the process of the district’s reconfiguration study so far at Tuesday’s meeting, which was attended by fewer than 10 members of the public, with about 40 people watching via the ConVal YouTube channel.

In the fall of 2022, the board voted to hire an outside consulting firm to study the effects of under-enrollment on the district’s ability to provide equitable education and to look at ways to lower costs to the taxpayer. The ConVal school district, comprised of nine towns and 11 schools and encompassing 250 square miles, is currently running at about 40% capacity, with the district’s eight elementary schools the most severely impacted by low numbers.

The most-recent elementary school enrollment numbers are 37 at Temple Elementary School, 43 at Francestown Elementary School, 55 at Dublin Consolidated School, 62 at Pierce Elementary School in Bennington, 76 at Hancock Elementary School, 88 at Greenfield Elementary School, 133 at Antrim Elementary School and 243 at Peterborough Elementary School. Students in Sharon attend Peterborough Elementary School. 

Great Brook School currently enrolls 214 students, and South Meadow School has 349 students. ConVal High School, which has a capacity of 1,200 students, currently has 663 students enrolled.

“Due to under-enrollment, the current  physical environment is unsustainable,” said Alan Edelkind, the ConVal School Board representative from Dublin and chair of the Strategic Organization Committee (SOC).

The SOC hired Charlotte-based Prismatic Consulting, which specializes in equity and inclusion audits, to assess and analyze ConVal’s ability to provide an equitable education for all students. Prismatic began the information-gathering process during the summer, conducting focus groups and interviews with school staff, administrators, school board members and students, and hosted eight public community meetings, two online surveys and an online community survey to gather feedback from the public.

Peterborough School Board representative Tom Burgess provided statistics on Prismatic’s outreach activities.

“I just want to review the data gathering that Prismatic has done, as it’s been quite extensive,” Burgess said. “Prismatic visited the schools 58 separate times, not including the community meetings. They had nine focus groups with district staff, and six focus groups with middle- and high-school students. They also administered a student survey, which got 201 responses,” Burgess said.

Prismatic and the School Board is in the data-analysis phase of the project in preparation for releasing a recommendation in early December. 

In the public comment session of the meeting, Naomi Tucker of Peterborough advocated for later start times for ConVal schools.

“Speaking as a parent, a psychotherapist and a community member, I see the impact of early start times. I know that this topic has been included in the consolidation discussions, but I also wanted to highlight that this topic is important no matter the outcome of the consolidation process. Research clearly shows that it is beneficial for youth to start school later,” Tucker said.

Peterborough School Board representative Dr. Gregory Kriebel, who was a member of a committee that had examined the effects of early start times, expressed his full support for Tucker’s statement.

“Everything you said as far as social, emotional, physical safety concerns, all those  are absolutely research-based and absolutely true. They are also a part of our current five-year plan. I would encourage the board to look at that information and follow this lady’s lead,” Kriebel said.

On Dec. 4, Prismatic will send a proposal for addressing under-enrollment to the School Board and the community. The School Board and community members will have until Dec. 12 to review the proposal, and the public is invited to take part in a community forum to discuss the proposal on Dec. 12. The board will vote on the proposal Dec. 12 and , if needed, write a warrant article for the district’s Town Meetings in March, as well as Peterborough’s in May.

For information, visit schoolboard.convalsd.net.