1999-03-22 School Committee Minutes

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Regular Session -2- March 22, 1999 Chair D'Antona thanked Ms. Spence for her comment and stated that the Committee had not discussed the issue of uniforms but when/if they did, public input would be welcome. Dr. Harutunian showed the Technology Department's highlight video. Dr. Harutunian showed the video of Barrows' Read Across America Commercial and local news broadcasts of activities at Barrows. SCHOOL BUILDING COMMITTEE (out of order) Russ Graham, Chairman of the School Building Committee reviewed the events of the Special Election held in January and the options now available to the School Committee. He stated that the School Building Committee would be meeting again and they were anxious to receive information from the Reading Memorial High School Feasibility Study. Mr. Graham introduced two new members of the School Building Committee, Alex McRae and Dennis LaCroix. Mr. Stohlman stated that he asked in February that the SBAB put in writing their decision that the Barrows project was tied to the new school, and he has not yet received anything from the SBAB. He stated that he believed the special election vote split the projects because people did not feel that we could afford both projects. Dr. Harutunian advised that he had requested this information from SBAB but has not received anything from them yet. He was noted that SBAB's new deadline was March 1St and that could be contributing to the delay. A discussion was held regarding centralized kindergarten. Mr. Graham stated that the SBAB will not reimburse for a centralized kindergarten at RMHS unless an entire renovation is done which, at this time, would be cost prohibitive. Ms. Phillips- Spence noted that having a centralized kindergarten would, budget wise, be almost the equivalent of having a fifth elementary school. To run a kindergarten with 400 students you would need a principal and all related staff and bussing costs would increase significantly. Dr. Harutunian stated that the preliminary RMHS Feasibility Study indicates that by 2012 -2013 the enrollment at RMHS could exceed the maximum capacity of 1,600 students. If that occurred, any kindergarten classes would have to be moved out of the high school.