South Bend school board mulls expanding full-day kindergarten

Tribune Staff Report

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By WSBT 24/7 News

Story Created: Mar 10, 2009 at 12:42 PM EST

Story Updated: Mar 10, 2009 at 1:00 PM EST

SOUTH BEND — The South Bend Community School Corp. board will hold a working session at 4 p.m. Thursday to discuss how it can expand full-day kindergarten to all of its roughly 1,600 kindergartners.

The working session is open to the public, but public comments won’t be heard. The meeting will be in the Administration Building, 215 S. St. Joseph St. It will be broadcast live on radio station WETL, 91.7 FM.

Out of all 80 kindergarten classes in the district, 21 have half-day sessions.

The board has talked about expanding full-day classes to all students in recent years. Last year, it didn’t move forward because board trustees were worried about the finances.

Educators and trustees for the corporation feel that students in full-day sessions have an advantage over kids in half-day sessions.

Trustees learned in a board meeting March 2 that the expansion of full-day classes would mean pulling an extra $416,616 from the corporation’s general fund.

At that meeting, Superintendent James Kapsa and trustees said cuts may need to be made elsewhere to cover that expense.

Much of the funding for full-day kindergarten comes from the federal Title I program, which is focused on helping needy students.

But, administrators told the board, if the corporation leaves the kindergarten program as it is, 19 of its 59 full-day sessions may have to revert to half days in the fall semester because of recent Title I issues.

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