Enrollment takes sharp drop

Copyright 2017, The Commercial Review

All Rights Reserved

Enrollment in Jay Schools has dropped much more rapidly than expected, making school closings and further consolidation virtually inevitable.

Superintendent Jeremy Gulley told school board members Monday that the enrollment count on the official date of Sept. 15 came in at 3,266.

That’s down 114 from last year.

“That’s the biggest one-year drop in 10 years,” said Gulley. “It’s more than we expected.”

A portion of that drop is apparently tied to Pennville area students opting to attend Southern Wells Schools after the closing of Pennville Elementary School this fall.

But more than half of the students who departed did so because their families moved out of the school district.

Gulley said 87 students moved out of the county. Twenty-seven of those moved out of state, and seventeen moved out of the region.

“I’m not sure what’s driving that number, and it’s a pretty remarkable number,” he said.

The decline means that state support — which is based on enrollment — will drop about $548,000 from the projected 2018 budget.

And that budget also was based upon the calculation that Judge Haynes Elementary School will be closed after this school year. A board decision on the Haynes closing won’t happen until December, but at this point it may be impossible to avoid.

“We project deficits if no adjustments are made,” said Gulley, noting that the corporation’s general fund is already projected to have a historically low balance at the end of the calendar year.

Further school closings may only be a few years away.

Gulley, who has assembled a facility study committee in order to develop possible future configurations of the school district, outlined a couple of different potential scenarios for the board Monday.

He stressed at the outset that one possibility — combining the two middle schools at the East Jay location — had been rejected.

“We are ruling that out,” he said.

The two options shape up this way:

•The Jay County High School building would become a grade 7 through 12 facility, with the building split to keep younger students and older students separated as much as possible. The East Jay Middle School building would become an intermediate elementary school facility for grades 3 through 6.

The West Jay Middle School building would be converted into a new kindergarten through grade 6 elementary in Dunkirk. The East Elementary building would be a kindergarten through grade 2 facility, which would happen with Judge Haynes closing. Redkey and Bloomfield elementaries would continue as kindergarten through grade 6 facilities. Westlawn Elementary’s building would close with its students shifted to the West Jay building. And General Shanks Elementary would close.

•The second scenario is similar, but sixth-grade students would be in the middle school portion of a revamped version of the JCHS building, while the elementaries would be kindergarten through grade 5.

“This is initial conceptual analysis,” said Gulley. “It invites comments. It invites questions.”

Two public meetings have been scheduled for input on the reconfiguration concept.

The first will be at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 28 at West Jay Middle School.

The second will be at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 10 at East Jay Middle School.

Gulley’s analysis drew an initial positive response from the board.

“There’s a lot to be considered,” said board president Kristi Betts. “Unfortunately, with this year’s (enrollment) count, we’re behind the 8-ball again.”

“This is a responsible direction to go,” said board member Phil Ford. “You have given us a wealth of information … and more vision for long-term planning in this corporation than I’ve seen in 20 years.”

Along with public input, Gulley said he has commissioned a demographic study to more closely identify projected future enrollment in various parts of the county. That study is expected to come back to the board in late October or early November.

He also noted that any such configuration plan would require a certain amount of renovation and construction cost. While West Jay Middle School could be transformed into an elementary school relatively easily, work at the JCHS building would be more substantial. And those renovations at the high school building could take 18 months.

“If we’re going to spend dollars on schools, we need to use them as efficiently as possible,” Gulley said.

Gulley’s analysis also included options on a timeline. One would call for a decision in the 2018-2019 school year and the new configuration being implemented in the 2020-2021 school year. The other would involve a decision in the 2019-2020 school year and reconfiguration taking effect in the 2021-2022 school year.

He also noted that there were a number of other factors to be considered, such as the impact on team teaching and block scheduling. Those and other issues are a part of the ongoing discussion, he said.

In other business, board members Kristi Betts, Ron Laux, Phil Ford, Cory Gundrum, Beth Krieg, and Krista Muhlenkamp, with Mike Shannon absent:

•Gave final approval to a 2018 budget calling for general fund spending of $23,352,001, debt service of $3,999,459, capital projects totaling $3,400,000, transportation spending of $2,592,000, bus replacement at $796,000 and pension debt service of $891,318.

•Learned Jay Schools continued to outperform the state average in the 2016-17 ISTEP test, with local scores 5 percentage points above the state average.

•Authorized an auction of surplus equipment which will be tentatively held at 4 p.m. Oct. 13 at the former bus garage at East Jay Middle School.

•Accepted a $1,000 grant from the Dollar General Literacy Foundation for Bloomfield Elementary’s literacy programs.

•Hired Richard Raines Jr. as a custodian at West Jay and Melissa Conley as a school bus aide.

•Approved leaves of absence for instructional assistant Megan Rowles, preschool teacher Erin Homan, instructional assistant Brittany Hemmelgarn and special education teacher Sarah Cook.

•Approved extracurricular assignments for Pazia Williams as assistant girls’ basketball coach at JCHS, Donald Gillespie as boys’ basketball coach at East Elementary, Olivia Cash as cheer sponsor at East Jay, Catherine Berno as girls’ basketball coach at Judge Haynes, Lisa Morgan as Just Say No sponsor at West Jay, Patrick Byrum as assistant baseball coach at JCHS, Christie Sommers as assistant swim coach at JCHS, Ashley Loucks as cheer coach at JCHS, Larry Wilson as boys’ basketball coach at Redkey and Tom Leonhard as football coach at West Jay and East Jay.

•Accepted the extracurricular resignation of Michelle Hart as sixth grade girls’ basketball coach at West Jay.

•Approved field trips by JCHS German students and JCHS FFA members.