Plan for all-day kindergarten poses challenges

DAYTON (AP) — Gov. Ted Strickland’s proposal to create all-day kindergarten classes has some already cash-strapped school districts worried that the added cost will further strain budgets.

Gary Smiga, the schools superintendent in Centerville near Dayton, says his district would need 15 additional classrooms and 15 more teachers if Strickland’s proposal became reality.

Just building the extra classrooms would cost about $1 million, and support staff, maintenance and other operating expenses will add more to annual expenses, he said.

“You’d have a pretty good ongoing cost of probably a million dollars a year,” Smiga said. “Where would those funds come from and how much of the funding would be the state’s responsibility?”

Centerville’s district gets about 15 percent of everyday education costs from the state, Smiga said. But if all-day kindergarten is implemented, and that funding ratio remains, then the local community will be stuck with most of the additional cost, he said.

Strickland has said he’ll increase education funding over the next two years by $925 million, and expanding all-day kindergarten to every Ohio school district is a key component of his long-term education plan.

The Ohio Department of Education says 448 of the state’s 613 districts already have all-day kindergarten, which is mandatory for districts that get poverty-based assistance from the state.

Strickland has so far said little about how his education plans would be funded, leaving the details for when he unveils his two-year budget proposal today.

Though the governor’s kindergarten proposal is a good educational idea, it’s also a logistical nightmare that would double salary costs for kindergarten teachers and require curriculum changes, said David Baker, the superintendent of the Springboro school district south of Dayton.

“Some of the things you’re going to be covering are currently being covered in first grade,” he said. “So then the first grade would need to change their curriculum and so would the second grade, and on and on.”