You’ve heard of regional high schools … How about regional school districts? |
On Board Online • June 9 2014
By Wayne Rogers
Area 6 Director
The challenge to all our schools today is to provide good leadership and a quality education for students despite the fiscal difficulties they face. In smaller school districts, the search for a superintendent can be complicated by the fact that the best salary the district can offer may price them out of the market or leave them with a pool of candidates lacking experience. Were it not for retired superintendents’ willingness to serve as interims, some of these school districts might be without a superintendent.
Other issues in rural education include declining student populations, less course variety than our urban and suburban counterparts and lack of economies of scale. What’s the solution?
At least 44 school districts including many small and rural districts have explored mergers in New York State in recent years, according to NYSSBA Senior Research Analyst Paul Heiser. But many attempts have been fruitless despite support from – and considerable effort by – the school boards and administrative teams involved.
For instance, in the Leatherstocking region, the Mohawk and Ilion school districts attempted to merge with two other districts in January 2012, but a straw poll failed in one district. Then a three-way merger was attempted, but that also failed. In February 2013, Mohawk and Ilion voters overwhelmingly approved a two-way merger.
Other districts have sought to economize by sharing a superintendent. For instance, the St. Regis Falls and Brushton-Moira districts began sharing a superintendent three years ago. Recently, however, St. Regis Falls elected to opt out of this sharing.
A third option that has yet to be widely discussed is the creation of regional school districts. In 2012, three BOCES district superintendents submitted testimony to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s New York Education Reform Commission on this topic. Stephen Shafer of Franklin-Essex-Hamilton BOCES, Thomas Burns of St. Lawrence-Lewis BOCES and the now-retired Craig King of Champlain Valley Educational Services stated: “A regional school district that would allow schools and communities to maintain their identity, expand educational opportunities, and achieve financial savings may be more appealing to certain communities than the traditional merger model, a regional high school, tuitioning out high school students, or sharing a superintendent.”
Under a regional structure, all schools in the merging districts would continue to operate. Each district would be able to keep its high school and the extracurricular recognition that is highly valued by many communities. At the same time, having the ability to have a common schedule would provide increased opportunities for a wider variety of courses through distance learning and shared staff. Advanced courses in math or languages could be possible. The school that could not otherwise offer, say, physics, would have access to a physics teacher.
On the cost-saving side, there could be a single superintendent and business office along with consolidation of transportation systems and operations and maintenance personnel. Data management could be centralized as well. Considering the geographic area of NYSSBA Area 6 and the 50 school districts scattered throughout, I think a regional school district option would offer cost savings and education-enhancing benefits for many school districts, both large and small.
In many ways, this resembles the centralization process that was seen in the mid-1950’s in New York State and in the development of county-wide school districts in other states. The Shafer-Burns-King proposal differs in that it allows existing schools to retain their identity – a critical concern to voters.
One issue of keen interest to school board members would be the composition of a single board of education under the proposed regional approach. Who would represent whom? Several options were discussed by the district superintendents.
Two school districts that form a regional school district could have two members from within the respective boundaries of the two dissolving districts and one, three or five at-large members. If five districts were combining, the regional school board might consist of one member each from within the respective boundaries of the five dissolving districts and two, four or six at-large members.
Districts need viable choices if we are to create changes. While the merger option will work for some and a regional high school may be the answer to others, the formation of a regional school district can offer opportunity as well.