St. Armand town Supervisor Davina Thurston speaks to the Saranac Lake Central School District Board of Education last week. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

BLOOMINGDALE — Saranac Lake Central School District Superintendent Diane Fox has a big decision coming up that will decide where students in grades three, four and five will attend school next year.

The district plans to reconfigure its classroom locations for these grades as it cuts one of its four classrooms in these grade levels amid staffing cuts, funding shrinkage and declining student enrollment.

“We do not have enough students to field four classrooms,” SLCSD board Chair Mark Farmer said.

The district has three classrooms for these grades at Petrova Elementary and one at Bloomingdale Elementary. It needs to cut one. The question is, which one?

One option would cut a room from Petrova and transfer around five students from each of the grade levels to Bloomingdale — having two classrooms at Petrova and one at Bloomingdale.

The other option would be to cut the Bloomingdale class and move all Bloomingdale students in these three grade levels to Petrova — filling the three classrooms currently at Petrova and having none at Bloomingdale. This would essentially make Bloomingdale a pre-K to second-grade school.

Fox said she’s not married to either option right now. Both have their own pros and cons. But she has not heard of a viable third option so far. She’ll likely make her decision public next week.

There are numerous variables at play — money, educational equity between the schools, special education services, staffing, students, parents, transportation, buildings, class sizes and impacts on the community.

Parents of students who would be caught in the shift have called the prospect “scary.”

The school board held a meeting at Bloomingdale Elementary last week where residents packed the gymnasium to give their input on the decision, with most asking for these grade levels to continue being offered at the Bloomingdale school. Fox also said she received around 20 letters from parents and students. People are very connected to their schools, she said.

There’s no right answer, Fox said. Everyone is right in what they’re saying, she added, but everyone is looking at it from their own perspective. The situation is just not ideal. One option will upset Bloomingdale Elementary students, parents and staff; the other option will upset students, parents and staff at Petrova Elementary.

It will be a huge disruption for people either way. Board Member Justin Garwood said, in either case, though, the district is “damn lucky” that both elementary schools are good education centers.

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Parents’ concerns

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Last week, Bloomingdale residents advocated to keep classes for grades three through five at their school.

Bloomingdale residents and leaders have concerns about their school closing, especially after the board began taking steps to seriously consider the possibility last year. A shift in students away from Bloomingdale, while not directly related to the school’s future, is connected.

St. Armand town Supervisor Davina Thurston said the school is incredibly important for her community. People move to Bloomingdale so their children can attend it, some kids do better in schools with less busy environments and it provides an oasis for children in the far-flung reaches of the expansive district, who would otherwise have much longer trips to school.

Jill Henck has a son at Petrova and a daughter coming into pre-K. She said splitting them up would be very hard. Parent Jennifer Lieb almost cried as she spoke about the impact a shift away from Bloomingdale Elementary could have on her kids.

“My kids have blossomed (here),” she said of Bloomingdale Elementary.

They live far out of town. Her children get on a bus at 6:15 a.m. and it takes them two hours to get home. She has changed her work schedule to meet them at a mid-way point so they don’t spend all day on the bus.

Fox said the district would rework new bus routes if a change is made, to minimize their length.

Parent Eben Ploof said a shift away from Bloomingdale Elementary would have a big impact on his family. His two kids go to Bloomingdale in first and third grades.

Farmer said there’s a possibility that families with more than one child could request to have them attend the same school. But Ploof said he’s concerned about splitting his daughter away from a class she’s fond of.

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Equity in education

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Fox said the decision is about equity — equal access to education between the schools.

Right now, she said things are not equitable for all students. Bloomingdale has smaller class sizes with more staff-per-student. But there are more special education services at Petrova. There are no special education service staff at Bloomingdale.

Farmer’s initial thought on the options was to have two classrooms at Petrova and one at Bloomingdale, but he said it’s more complicated than he expected. He said this would require splitting elementary special education services between the two schools. Similarly, making Bloomingdale a pre-K to second grade school would need more special education staffing, but the younger grades require fewer of these services.

The district cannot afford to duplicate and double the special services staff.

It’s not a job that can be shared between the two schools, they said. There’s not quite enough work to create a new full-time position, but splitting existing staff between the two buildings would spread them too thin.

Board Member Zachary Randolph said he’s been troubled that special education students have never had a choice — it’s always Petrova, even if they might do better at a smaller school like Bloomingdale.

Thurston gets calls from parents of kids with special needs who want them to attend Bloomingdale but can’t because of the lack of services. Kelsey Stanton’s daughter moved from Bloomingdale Elementary to Petrova for services and said there were a lot of tears in the move.

Randolph said these students have never been able to have this conversation and that they have a right to the same opportunities.

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A plan and a plane

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A closure of the Bloomingdale school would be a board decision. The board has promised not to take any action until the idea is researched by a committee involving members of the public.

Fox said the committee will look at the long-term plans. Right now, they need to figure out what’s most equitable for students next year.

Farmer said they’ll likely form the committee soon — in late summer or the start of the school year. The board plans to reach out to the people who expressed interest in being on the committee last year first, and then solicit more members if they don’t have enough.

Parents and Bloomingdale residents have voiced beliefs that Fox’s intention is to close the school before she retires next year and that a student shift away from it would be a step toward closing the school.

“My intention is not to close Bloomingdale before I leave,” Fox said when asked about this. “My intention is to leave a plan for the incoming superintendent that continues to provide opportunities for our students in a way that supports our taxpayers.”

Ploof asked how long the administration knew this student shift was coming for, and questioned why they only solicited public opinion after the district budget was passed. He said the budget already put a plan in place.

“You clearly have a plan,” he said.

Building the plane as they fly it is bad government, Ploof said.

“How are we justifying the increase in the administrative budget?” Ploof asked.

Board Member Nancy Bernstein said the budget got this tight just recently, with state and federal aid loss in February and March.

“We built the plane,” Garwood said. “And then in February, the federal government came and chopped one of the wings off.”

He said they’re rebuilding the plane as they’re flying it. There’s a lot of uncertainty and he feels they’re caught between a rock and a hard place.

Still, parent Kelly Fuller said this has been tough timing for her daughter, who has been upset that she didn’t know things this year might be her “lasts” at Bloomingdale Elementary. Fuller said her daughter felt the short notice was “cruel” and that her daughter even wrote an email to Fox.

Fox, who was an administrator for schools in Cadyville and Dannemora which the Saranac Central School District closed, said she saw how knowing the schools are going to close can be tough for a whole year, too.

Student ex-officio board member Sam Clark was part of a group who moved to the Bloomingdale school from Petrova several years ago. He said the change was actually beneficial, that he got to make new friends and, for him, it was a great experience.

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Enrollment decline

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The district has lost 46% of the student population it had in the mid-1990s, when enrollment cracked 1,900. This year, the district had 1,039 students, around 860 fewer than 30 years ago.

Consistently, the district graduates more students than it brings in. This year, the district expects to have an 89-student graduating class, and has had 68 students in kindergarten.

Last year, the board got the results of a study of its facilities and projected student enrollment. That study predicted 55 incoming kindergartners this past September. But the district had 64 new kindergartners. Fox said since their first data point was way off, they postponed discussions of closing Bloomingdale Elementary.

But this year, they are only predicting an incoming class of 45 kindergartners. Fox said this is unlikely to get much higher over the summer. The largest jump they’ve ever seen was 12.

Thurston’s not so sure the downward enrollment trend will last forever. There are several ongoing housing initiatives with the Trudeau Village, Saranac Lofts and people building single-family in St. Armand. The district’s population is set to grow soon. Parent Annie Arnold said she lives in the “suburb” of Vermontville and has seen many families with small children moving there in recent years.

If that trend reverses, Thurston said the district will want space to teach all the new students.

Bloomingdale resident Nancy Heath said the Bloomingdale school is a resource — being the district’s newest building, with more room to spare than Petrova and one servicing the outer reaches of the district. She said the district should use it.

Fox said the change in classrooms she’s making a decision on now would not be forever and could be reversed if these variables change.

To read more about the district’s enrollment decline, go to tinyurl.com/5ept6av6. To read more about the reasons behind the student shift, go to tinyurl.com/m6vd63az.