Shawnee Mission plans to get rid of fee for all-day kindergarten, cut class sizes

Parents of elementary school-age children in parts of Johnson County may not need to open their wallets as wide next fall.

The Shawnee Mission Board of Education on Monday voted to eliminate fees for all-day kindergarten and reduce some of the rental fees for textbooks, beginning in the 2015-2016 school year.

Currently, parents can send their children either to half-day kindergarten, which has no added fee, or full-day kindergarten, which costs $2,430 a year. Beginning next fall, there will be no fees for anyone.

Superintendent Jim Hinson said the change was part of a multi-year effort to allow all children to participate in all-day kindergarten. He said the district will be able to absorb the estimated loss of $1.8 million in revenue through budget cuts it has implemented in recent years, such as reorganizing its printing contracts and consolidating some positions.

He added, however, that the district would have to start over if the Kansas Legislature fails in its effort to replace the existing state school funding formula with block grants or the state courts allow legal challenges of the block grant plan to move forward.

“Certainly, things could change very significantly for us in the school district depending on what happens in Topeka and in the judicial system,” Hinson said.

The board also voted to eliminate the $20 a year students in preschool through sixth grade must pay for their textbooks. Students in grades 7-12 will still pay $80 a year.

Hinson said the reduction in textbook rental fees comes thanks to the district amassing a $2 million surplus on textbook fees this year and having no plans to buy additional elementary school-level books next year.

He said the two changes are expected to save the district $225,000 in clerical costs as staff won’t have to deal with collections and other elementary school fee processing. He said that clerical time will be diverted to other areas and won’t equal a financial savings.

Board member Cindy Neighbor welcomed the change, saying it would help many families, including those that were currently forced to send their young children to day care.

“I know for families that have multiple children in the district that can be an expensive time in August,” Neighbor said.

In other business, Hinson said that because the state block grant legislation caps class sizes at 27 students instead of the current 30, officials at the district’s 33 elementary schools are currently evaluating whether they will be able to accommodate the extra classes. If not, he said the district will likely restrict new students transferring into the district to attend those schools.

The board also received an update on new efforts to make it easier for the district to tackle bullying in school.

John Douglass, district director of safety and security, said a new “shortcut” program is being added to student computers this week that will be quicker than the current online forms that students and parents can use to anonymously report bullying incidents.

Douglass said the big addition is that the district will now be able to track how quickly and successfully school administrators are handling those reports and give district officials more information into which schools are having the most problems.

“If we are in fact postponing dealing with something for an inordinate amount of time this will let us know that and deal with that,” Douglass said.

This story was originally published April 28, 2015 at 11:01 AM with the headline "Shawnee Mission plans to get rid of fee for all-day kindergarten, cut class sizes."