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Cowart: Blackrock School ‘Status Quo’ Unsustainable

[CREDIT: Rob Borkowski] In Coventry RI news, Hilary Connors speaks about the Coventry Schools Restructure plan at the Jan. 11 School Committee meeting at Coventry Middle School.

COVENTRY, RI — Coventry Schools budget cuts may spare Blackrock School the early learning center conversion Superintendent Don Cowart proposed Jan. 11, but a Blackrock ‘status quo’ will have ‘unsustainable’ effects, he said.

School Committee Chairman James Pierson said the restructure is a possible measure to bridge a $1.5 million deficit. The plan converts Blackrock School as an early learning center, and creates two sister-school pairs: Washington Oak (K-3) / Western Coventry (4-5) and Tiogue (K-12) /Hopkins Hill (3-5). The middle school and high school would not be changed.

The ‘status quo’ plan would rely on enrollment data for staffing cuts, eliminating four elementary teaching positions and two interventionist positions, saving the district $1.04 million with pending retirements. This plan would require cutting positions, programs and extracurricular activities at the middle school and high school, according to Cowart’s assessment.

Cowart proposed his plan to the School Committee, its first public introduction, that night to a packed and unsympathetic room. Scores of parents and teachers urged the Committee to provide documentation about the pros and cons of the plan. Speakers also criticized them for not coming to the meeting with those details prepared, and for scheduling a vote on the plan less than a week after announcing it.

A new meeting to discuss Cowart’s revised proposal will be held by the School Committee Feb. 5, said Pierson. The meeting to vote on the proposal, originally set for Jan. 16,  was rescheduled to Feb. 8.

Cowart sent a letter by email to the community on Jan. 19, also posted to the district’s Facebook page,  to address questions raised during the Jan. 11 meeting. That letter included an online form for the public to submit followup questions.
“There’s another communication going out this week with responses to those questions,” Pierson said.
Cowart’s Jan. 19 message includes an A/B comparison of his plan and a standard cost-cutting approach to the deficit, which he referred to as the “status quo.”

The primary difference between the two plans is the number of staff cuts and the resulting cost savings. Cowarts plan would eliminate 10-15 elementary teaching positions, saving the district $2.1 million with pending retirements, “allowing the district to maintain intervention and support services for students,” according to his comparison.
The ‘status quo’ plan would rely on enrollment data for staffing cuts, eliminating four elementary teaching positions and two interventionist positions, saving the district $1.04 million with pending retirements. This plan would require cutting positions, programs and extracurricular activities at the middle school and high school, according to Cowart’s assessment.
“Without consolidating resources, the impact of cuts is less strategic and unsustainable. It’s the approach that has been taken in the past and has limited options,” Cowart writes in the comparison.
Dorinne Albright, a Blackrock parent opposed to Cowart’s plan, said she and other parents were not certain what the “status quo” plan entailed.
“It was confusing on the second option if Blackrock would be left as an elementary school because in some places it refers to four schools and others to all five.  A couple of parents reached out for clarification and were told that the second option would leave Blackrock as-is, ” Albright said, “I would greatly prefer the second plan, and most of us agree that if it has to be one or the other we prefer the second option as it leaves Blackrock functioning as an elementary school and doesn’t employ the split-model elementary.”

Rob Borkowski
Author: Rob Borkowski

Rob has worked as reporter and editor for several publications, including The Kent County Daily Times and Coventry Courier, before working for Gatehouse in MA then moving home with Patch Media. Now he's publisher and editor of WarwickPost.com. Contact him at editor@warwickpost.com with tips, press releases, advertising inquiries, and concerns.

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