During a community forum Wednesday at Francestown Elementary School conducted by Prismatic, the educational consulting firm hired by the ConVal School Board to address under-enrollment in the district’s schools, Lee Davis, a business owner whose children attended ConVal schools, expressed concerns about any possibility of Francestown Elementary School closing.

As of Sept. 1, Francestown Elementary had 43 students, more than only the 37 at Temple Elementary School.

“We can’t be the only district with this problem. What have other districts done? Losing the school would impact everyone’s property values,” he said. “Why would young families move here if there was no school, if they found out their children were going to be on the bus for an hour? My first choice, given the options, would be to being the upper grades back down to the elementary school and keep the school open.”

The session was the fifth of nine in the ConVal district’s towns, and about 50 Francestown residents attended. Residents were given the opportunity to cast weighted ballots, write in responses and submit their opinions on different options presented by Prismatic – combining as many schools as possible, including perhaps the middle schools; keep ConVal like it is now; combine only some of the elementary schools; and keep all the elementary schools, but move grades five and six back to those schools.

Computers were also provided for attendees to take the online survey about reconfiguration options. TatiaPrieto of Prismatic noted that so far, Hancock has the highest response rate. As of Wednesday night, 800 people living in the ConVal district had filled out surveys, factoring in faulty responses which had to be eliminated, and 22% of the surveys had been completed by residents of Hancock. Of the total respondents, 45% reported being over 61 years of age, with the lowest response rate falling in the 18-to-30 age group, followed by 31-to-40 age group. Prismatic will release the results of the survey and data from all meetings in December.

“Those first two age brackets probably include many  parents of young children, and they are the people who could be most affected by changes in the school district,” Prieto said. “We encourage every resident of the ConVal district to take the survey. This is everyone’s chance to be heard.”

Randall Thibault, the father of a preschooler, attended the meeting.

“We both took the survey and we’re both curious about what the options might be in the future for Francestown,” he said. “We have a 3-year-old coming to kindergarten in a few years, and we had no idea anything was maybe going to change with the schools when we moved here.”

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Davis recalled being a student at Antrim High School when the school closed in 1969, sending Antrim students to high school in Peterborough.

“It’s a terrible thing when a town loses a school. It really takes away from the community. I know it deeply affected Antrim,” he said. “Another question is, what would we do with this beautiful new school building? Would they just sit here and fall apart? That’s a liability for the town and such a waste.”

Davis’ wife Leslie agreed that the school is essential for bringing a community together.

“Kids needs friends in their own community. If they’re on the bus for 45 minutes or an hour each way and end up with friends who live an hour away, that’s really hard on the kids and the families,” she said.

After visiting the interactive activity stations,  Linda Kunhardt expressed disappointment that meeting was not more of a community event.

“I call this a ‘faux’ community event, because there was no discussion, no chance  for people to have a conversation,” she said. “I was hoping to get a sense of how the community feels, like at Town Meeting. This was just weird. I have no idea how the community feels. I didn’t really get to talk to anybody. It was like a pretend community event.”

The final Prismatic meetings are Monday, Oct. 2, at Pierce School in Bennington, Wednesday, Oct. 4, at 7 p.m. at Dublin Consolidated School and Thursday, Oct. 5, at  7 p.m. at Hancock Elementary School. The online survey is available at research.net/r/convalcomsep.