The drumbeat grows louder for full-day kindergarten in North Shore School District 112, which covers Highland Park and Highwood, as school officials in Deerfield’s District 109 fine-tune their full-day plan for next school year,
As of Tuesday, almost 250 people had signed a Change.org petition urging District 112 to provide full-day kindergarten. In previous interviews, District 112 officials have said there’s not enough space to implement full-day kindergarten. That’s an insufficient response, according to Melissa Feldman, the Highland Park parent who started the petition.
“The surrounding areas are passing full-day kindergarten,” Feldman said in a recent interview. “We’re getting left behind.”
Feldman’s daughter is currently enrolled in a dual language pilot program at Oak Terrace Elementary School in Highwood that provides full-day kindergarten. Her growth in language and math skills has been “incredible,” the mother said.
“I want other kids to benefit like my daughter has benefited,” Feldman said.
In an email to community members earlier this month, District 112 Superintendent Michael Bregy said he believed full-day kindergarten would “best serve” kids in the district, but that there’s not enough classroom space.
“While it is also a priority in our district, we face the unique circumstances of undertaking a study to reconfigure our entire district,” Bregy said in the email. “Plans for full-day kindergarten are being carried out in that context, and we are working daily on our reconfiguration plans.”
Any reconfiguration plan that moves forward will include full-day kindergarten, Bregy said, but the administrative staff will also be gathering information on “the facilities and staffing resources necessary to support full-day kindergarten” before the reconfiguration.
District 112 officials have targeted March 2016 for a referendum vote; if passed, the massive project likely would likely take years to implement.
That’s too long for District 112 parents to wait for full-day kindergarten, said Feldman, a former elementary school teacher. Over the years, academic demands in kindergarten have increased, she said, and a half day of instruction is not enough.
Other North Shore communities are considering or have recently launched full-day kindergarten programs. Parents in Wilmette’s District 39 have also launched their own petition, calling for “educationally-rich full-day kindergarten environment for our children at every neighborhood school.”
State data from the 2013-14 school year shows that about 90 percent of Illinois elementary schools offer full-day kindergarten.
“I really think it’s a North Shore phenomenon of being late to the game when it comes to full-day kindergarten,” said District 109 Superintendent Michael Lubelfeld in an interview Tuesday.
Earlier this month, Deerfield’s District 109 school board approved full-day kindergarten beginning in the fall for a tuition of $2,600 per student. The fee’s intended cover the increased costs for staffing, transportation and supplies, school officials have said.
Lubelfeld said 226 students were confirmed for full-day kindergarten next year, while parents of six children indicated a preference for half day. If parents of fewer than 15 students opt for the half-day program, Lubelfeld said, those students will participate in part of the full-day class at no cost.
If the number of half-day students hits 15 or greater, the district would then provide a separate half-day program, in addition to the full-day program, he said.
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