District poised to approve new kindergarten teachers

By Jennifer Eisenbart

Staff writer

If you walked into a kindergarten classroom in the Burlington Area School District Tuesday – or for that matter, Wednesday or Thursday – you were probably wondering what the fuss was about in terms of class sizes.

After all, for those first three days, there were a just a handful of students in the classroom – not the projected 25-30.

That’s due to the staggered start that Burlington uses for its youngest students as the school year kicks off.

“We do what we call a staggered start,” said BASD Superintendent Peter Smet. “One third of the kids come the first day. The second third comes the second day, and the third third comes on the third day.

“They all come on the fourth day.”

That fourth day will be Friday, and then it’s the weekend. By Monday evening, Smet and the district hope to have the extra kindergarten teachers they want to hire to alleviate class size issues ready for the School Board to approve.

“We are in the process of putting our information out, interviewing and preparing to hire teachers,” Smet said.

“We’ll hopefully have the majority of them, if not all of them, ready to go for the board Monday night.”

Last week, the Finance Committee approved a plan to address larger-than-expected kindergarten classes. As the proposal stands, a new teacher will be hired for Winkler, Cooper, Waller and Lyons, as well as an additional Montessori kindergarten teacher.

The cost is estimated to be roughly $290,000, which will come out of the district’s fund balance because of the late date.

While no hires will be official until Monday evening, Smet did say some of the potential new hires are starting to observe classes.

“They are starting to be in and around the schools, pending final board approval,” said Smet, who saw one of the new teachers Tuesday and another on Wednesday.

Individual grade-school principals are handling the hiring process for each school, and also working to find room for the extra class.

Winkler School already has its second kindergarten class in place, as Jennifer Libbey moved from second grade back to kindergarten.

Plans have also been made to hire her replacement, and that approval will go before the board next week. A substitute – retired Winkler teacher Deb Pingle – has been filling in in the meantime.

Because Winkler has always had two kindergarten sections, the extra room wasn’t a problem.

“It was happy news for us when we regained that kindergarten,” said Winkler principal Jennifer Barnabee, who also welcomed back two students who had been declined enrollment for Winkler and sent to their so-called “home” school due to the crowding.

Those students are back, and Barnabee is pleased with how things are going.

“For Winkler, (the transition) has been very smooth,” Barnabee said.