Canyon Elementary could close to save budget
Hungry Horse News
Faced with a projected budget shortfall of more than $500,000 next school year, the School District 6 board of trustees is strongly considering closing Canyon Elementary in Hungry Horse.
The district would offer to accommodate Canyon's nearly 100 kindergarten through fifth grade students in the district's two remaining K-5 schools — Glacier Gateway and Ruder, both in Columbia Falls.
"Canyon lost kids seven years in a row," trustee Larry Wilson said. "Those students can be absorbed down here by adding one teacher here."
Ruder enrollment as of Jan. 11 was 443, up 12 from October. Glacier Gateway' student count was 440, equal to the number in October.
But before the board votes on Canyon Elementary, perhaps as early as its next regular meeting on Feb. 8, district superintendent Mike Nicosia will invite the public to at least two presentations of the proposed closure. The meetings would be held on weekday nights at two locations — one in Columbia Columbia Falls and the other in or near Hungry Horse.
The dates of the meetings had not been set as of presstime. Check the Hungry Horse News Web site at www.hungryhorsenews.com for meeting times.
Among the points Nicosia made at Monday's board meeting that he's likely to repeat at the public hearings:
The 2010-2011 budget shortfall will be anywhere from $511,000 to $550,000, nearly evenly divided between the elementary schools and Columbia Falls High School.
An as-yet unset number of teachers and staff would need to look for work outside the district.
The district would be forced to cut programs for students at Ruder and Glacier Gateway if it does not close Canyon.
Closing Canyon will not solve the district's budget crisis, because the high school's budget is separate and will require drastic cuts as well.
The board could ask the public to vote for more money, but it doesn't have the authority to ask for as much as it needs, and trustees seemed resigned to the probability that voters, worried about unemployment, would oppose a mill-levy increase.
Trustee Dean Chisolm pointed out that school boards around the nation are wrestling with similar decisions. He cited Colorado, where the Jefferson County school board outside Denver will vote today, Jan. 14, on a citizen panel's recommendation to close four elementary and middle schools.
Closing Canyon would "protect all the students of the district," he said.
The board's consideration of closure did not surprise the Canyon teachers who attended Monday's meeting. Rumors of the closure circulated through the canyon community even before the board met Saturday for a half-day retreat to discuss the matter. Even so, hearing the board discussion proved disheartening.
"A lot of our teachers and teachers' aides live in the canyon," kindergarten teacher Jean Fisher said. Among them: teachers for first, second and fourth grades, four aides, a secretary, a custodian and two kitchen workers.
"It's my personal philosophy that people and school districts should live within their means, but this is hard," she said
Fisher said her classroom is full of energy — 24 students in all, 18 of them boys. She hopes a benefactor will rescue the children's educational experience in the canyon.
"I believe in miracles," she said.