School board: Cast a critical eye

Gazette Editorial Board

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Superintendent David Benson, to no one's surprise, has recommended closing some elementary schools in Cedar Rapids to address excess building capacity and unbalanced distribution of students in a district that continues to lose enrollment and the state financial aid that comes with each pupil.

After weighing input from the public and an external advisers group of community leaders, Benson on Monday advised the school board to close Polk and Monroe schools. The board is expected to make its decision on March 12.

Two other schools on the potential list of closures, Harrison and Madison, were spared, at least for now. Benson also recommended closing the Monroe kindergarten center and making Wilson School, which houses students in grades 2-8, a middle school for grades 6-8 only. Grant Early Childhood center would become a K-5 elementary that would accommodate Wilson's students.

We're glad to see that Harrison and Madison were on Benson's still-open list. It's a sign that the school district wants to support the city's effort at rebuilding the west-side neighborhoods that were so heavily damaged by the flood. Benson advised that Harrison be given five years to turn around its enrollment decline, and that seems reasonable.

The brightest red flag in the recommendations, as we see it, is closing Polk. That school, with a high percentage of students from low-income families, has become a district leader in academic improvement in just a few years, accompanied by fewer behavior and attendance problems.

Benson did recommend that Polk students be allowed to attend any other school on the east-side or even Taylor, which, like Polk, uses a year-round calendar. However, when a school like Polk is making such big strides, is it wise to disband those students and its operation?

Closing Polk is one of the issues we urge the school board to carefully review before it renders a decision.

We also wonder whether the relatively modest $1 million annual expected savings in operating expenses justifies the disruptions in student and family lives that the proposed closings will bring. Just as important or more so, how will these plans affect the quality of education these students will receive? Will they help reverse the troubling enrollment decline, and how?

We urge the school board to do an extensive, critical review. Closing schools is a drastic step in almost any case - a decision that deserves more underpinnings than only the financial.

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