Springfield School Board grapples with funding questions

The Springfield School Board, like many districts regionally and nationwide, faces a shrinking budget coupled with intensifying classroom behavior from students with social-emotional obstacles.


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Springfield School Board grapples with funding questions | January 19, 2018 By PATRICK ADRIAN padrian@eagletimes.com SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield School Board, like many districts regionally and nationwide, faces a shrinking budget coupled with intensifying classroom behavior from students with social-emotional obstacles. It must determine how much more to invest to counter learning deficiencies that have historically been nourished by parents. Elm Hill Primary School Principal Christine Pereira met with the school board Tuesday to request an additional $281,000 in next year’s operating budget to strengthen classroom and behavioral intervention supports to students in her K-5 classrooms. The request includes three new hires — a certified behavioral analyst, an instructional assistant and an assistant principal, who would be shared with the other elementary school at Union Street. Pereira said she I seeking to expand her “push-in” approach to working with students who need social and emotional support. Rather than wait for students to escalate until they have to be removed from the classroom, Pereira’s team tries to spend more time in the classroom helping students work through frustrations or challenges and learn self-regulation tools. Board members, however, hoped to invest money for next year to academic programs, which they interpreted to mean advanced placement or enrichment offerings. “I just have to say,” board Chair Ed Caron told Superintendent Zach McLaughlin, “This is not my priority.” McLaughlin and Pereira said the best way to strengthen academics across the district is to target the earliest grades. “If we’re going to move academic achievement forward at this point,” McLaughlin explained, “We feel the biggest bang for our buck for academic achievement overall is improving climate [in the classrooms].” Educators across the region continually report rising numbers of incoming students lacking the essential developmental skills, not just academically but socially, emotionally and behaviorally. Springfield’s elementary principals, Pereira and Union Street School’s Nancy Wiese, explain that the severity of this problem, when unaddressed, impacts learning across the student body, and follow students into future grade levels. “I think we need to respectfully explain to the community how much has changed in the past few years,” Wiese told the board, “Most of our students are ready to learn. But the ones who aren’t, are more disregulated than anyone could ever imagine.” Wiese says that, in Elm Hill’s average class size of 17 students, statistically 2 or 3 of those will be suffering from mental illness related to trauma. These students in particular require a tremendous amount of time, energy and caring. “And if we don’t have the people to do the job, those kids will become so disruptive in the room that now it’s not just one student who isn’t learning. It’s seventeen,” Wiese said. According to district-wide survey conducted last spring, Springfield students indicate that the biggest barrier to their classroom learning is behavior of peers. In Pereira’s plan, if funded, the behavioral analyst would determine plans for targeted students in each classroom. Each Instructional Assistant would work with 5 classrooms, floating between each to work with students. The analyst would team with the assistant principal to train and support teachers in techniques for managing classroom environment and individual student challenges. This is only one phase of her broader vision, Pereira says, which will later include hiring a social worker and increasing the Instructional Assistants to five, to lessen their ratio of classrooms. However, board members questioned how much to keep investing in solutions that, so far, have not demonstrated a change. Board member Mike Griffin pointed out spending has been increased for team leaders, teacher training days, resources and instructional time for pre-kindergarten, and more. But promised results are not being seen, he said. “We’ve increased and increased and increased but it doesn’t feel like we are getting to where we want to be,” he told Pereria, “I’d hate to see us throw more money at the wall to see if it sticks,” Griffin asked the principals if their past strategies to reach these students have not worked, whether they take from those funds, rather than add upon them. Wiese explained that there will never be a single, one-time fix. The turnaround for these students will require ongoing support over time. “As much as I want to say that Pre-K is taking care of these issues, that is not the case,” Wiese said. Behavior is a habit, like smoking, she explained. Breaking those habits typically has side effects and people will need multiple attempts before finding success. The supports need to stay constant and continual during that process in order to work. The board has not made a decision yet about the funding request. “Regardless of what you do tonight,” said Finance Director Steve Hier, “this is a always great conversation. Next year we’re going to be looking at this again. We took some steps forward this year. But this is a path where heading down, so this is the foundation of discussion for next year and the year after.”