Options were mulled, nixed for Ford fix

LYNN – Desperate to find ways to save the Ford School Annex Building and improve the overall department budget, School Committee members and administrators presented several money-saving ideas Thursday night, but despite their best efforts, could not come up with anything that satisfied the department budget team.From a four-day work week to reoccupying buildings that have been closed, committee members and school employees bounced ideas off one another for more than an hour Thursday, but left in the end without deciding anything on the budget.Ford School Principal Claire Crane kicked off the brainstorming session when she joined the committee’s open microphone session prior to the meeting with several alternativeplans that would keep middle-school students at the Ford.Crane said she has received support from several churches and neighborhood organizations in the days following the announcement that the annex would close, and outlined one that would move kindergarten classes off-site to local church facilities.According to Crane, those facilities would offer services rent-free, asking the department only for utility money.A second plan that has also been discussed by the committee would move the annex out of 100 Bennett St. and to the Fecteau-Leary Junior Senior High School on North Common Street.The former Classical High School building is home to an alternative education program downstairs and the Classical Freshman Academy upstairs. With freshman due to head back to Classical’s main building on O’Callaghan Way in September, the space at the building is free.Superintendent Catherine Latham did not comment on the plans other than to say that the department has considered every option, and closing the annex appears to be the only way the department can save enough money under the current budget shortfall.With ideas running thin, committee member Vin Spirito brought up the popular and controversial thought of shifting to a four-day work week to save energy and facility costs, something that has been done in smaller, rural school districts in some part of the country.Latham said she had several concerns with the plan, the most glaring being that even if teachers and students shift to a four-day week, parents will still have to work five days, which would force expensive day-care costs.”We have thought about a four-day week and I just don’t know if that is feasible for working families,” she said. “I think that’s difficult. I am just not sure that it is possible.”Business Administrator Kevin McHugh said he has researched a four-day week, but savings to the district would be minimal given the overall expenses they are facing next year.Committee member John Ford also shot down the idea, noting that the overall focus in the education world is on keeping students in the classroom longer, not cutting time out of the schedule.”I just think if we go to a four-day it flies in the face of all the initiatives out there that say we need a longer school day,” he said.The committee did not vote on the budget Thursday and will reconvene May 28 for a committee of the whole meeting.