School District to Pick Up Tab for Full-Day Kindergarten, High School Activity Fee

The Board of Education on Monday voted to again foot the entire bill for full-day kindergarten in 2011-12, using a portion of $777,000 of received when the governor two weeks ago distributed extra school funding to school systems statewide.

The board unanimously agreed to allocate $283,560 for full-day kindergarten—meaning funds raised by local parents to preserve the program no longer need be used.

Another $70,000 to $100,000 will be put into the 2011-12 school budget to scrap a new plan to charge a student activities fee at Ridge High School, that would have started in the fall.

Another $200,000 of the state aid will be added into the budget to cover this year's settlement of a previously expired contract with the teachers union that was a net 2-percent increase instead of the anticipated 1.5 percent included in the approved 2011-12 school budet; and about $180,000 to $200,000 will be put toward needed facilities repairs, Business Administrator Nick Markarian said.

The organizers of the community group to keep the full-day kindergarten from being shortened this year have not yet met to discuss how the funds will be returned to parents and other donors, according to Deborah Naude, a representative from the Bernards Townshp Public School Initiative.

The group raised $450,000 in a brief period at the beginning of the year to fill in a school budget shortfall for this coming year and—school officials said they then believed—for future years.

As it turned out, Naude said, "This really was kind of a bridge loan with no interest," to keep the structure in place for full-day kindergarten until the district received the extra money."

Board President Susan Carlsson at Monday's meeting again credited the kindergarten group with preserving the program. Carlsson and Adam Hecht, who spearheaded the funding, previously said that it probably would have been too late to save the program even if added funding arrived at this late date if teachers had been fired, and the full-day program dismantled.

The school board's finance subcommittee had discussed recommendations for how to use the added school funds last Wednesday night. The school district did not take the option, as urged by Gov. Chris Christie, to use the extra school funding announced in mid-July to reduce the local school tax rate for 2011-12.

Carlsson previously said the board's decision to cut full-day kindergarten last November was one of the cost-saving measures for the 2011-12 school year make after a steep reduction in state aid the previous year. She said that decision, along with initially cutting the school day at Ridge High School from nine to eight periods, was made on the basis of the reduction of state aid from more than $3 million in 2009-10 to less than $900,000 for 2010-11.

This year, the governor's state aid figures released in late winter showed that Bernards Township School aid would increase to about $1.6 million for 2011-12, and the board voted to maintain the nine-period day at Ridge High School on that basis. Then, unexpectedly, the governor in mid-July increased aid to many New Jersey school districts for the coming year — including the additional $777,000 for the township's schools.

Carlsson has repeatedly said that it is difficult to plan for future school years not knowing what state aid the district can count on each year.