Most View Edgewood Discussions on Video

Photo by Evan Brandt

Pottstown School Superintendent Stephen Rodriguez, right, and business manager Maureen Jampo, wave to the livestreaming audience during a presentation on converting the former Edgewood Elementary School into a kindergarten center in order to be able to move the fifth grade out of Pottstown Middle School and back into the elementary schools.

It would be inaccurate to say that I was the only member of the audience for Monday afternoon's town hall meeting about converting the former Edgewood school into a kindergarten center.

I was just the only member of the physical audience at Barth Elementary School, other than the ever-present John Armato.

But by the time I got back home to write this up, I had heard from said John Armato that the presentation by Superintendent Stephen Rodriguez about the issues raised by the proposal had 92 views on the district's Facebook page where the presentation was livestreamed on video.

Click here to watch the presentation; or you can click here to watch the presentation from Oct. 24 at Rupert Elementary School. (That video already has more than 500 views).

I'm sure by the time you read this, that number from Monday afternoon will have at least doubled.

The final presentation will be held Friday, Nov. 8 at 9 a.m. at the administration building on Beech Street.

Rodriguez seems to have this presentation pretty well down. He indicated, as he has in the past, that this consideration is being driven by the desire to move the fifth grade back out of Pottstown Middle School, where they have been houses since 2015.

The cost to renovate the building, some of which will have to be undertaken whether the kindergarten center plan moves forward or not, hovers between $3 million to $6 million, not to mention some of the costs of busing.

On the down side, having kids go from pre-kindergarten programs, only half of which are in elementary buildings, to a kindergarten center, and then back to elementary schools is a lot of transitions which, educators know, can slow academic progress, particularly among the younger grades.

On the up side, kindergarten centers are fairly common, would allow for more flexibility and, or course, create the space to move the fifth graders back into the elementary schools, which is how we got here in the first place.

The district has looked at other place that have fifth grade in their middle school, such as Reading, but he said once you start getting down into the details or program and community expectations, the comparisons start to lose their value.

"People in Pottstown have very high expectations," Rodriguez said.

"There is a feeling of chagrin, I think, about the decision to move the fifth grade into the middle school. I think a lot of people think it was a big mistake," he said.

That said, Rodriguez said this discussion about Edgewood does not mean the district has made a final decision to move the fifth grade out of the middle school, only that it is looking at options.

One of those options is, of course, keeping things as they are now.

Currently, the district has added staff, including teachers, a security guard, several mentorship programs and mental health counselors through a partnership with Creative Health to try to improve behavior problems at the middle school.

The district has also focused most of its grant-making on the middle school, securing $2 million in grants for after-school programming -- academic, extra-curricular and career exploration -- to point middle schoolers in positive directions.

But Rodriguez said he does not expect any over-night miracles, such as a sudden jump in academic scores, and so far, the behavior statistics have yet to show any major improvements at the school building.

And, he said, the district could go through the steps and move the fifth grade out of the middle school and still find all the same academic and behavior problems at the school remain.

Should the school board decide to move forward with either turning Edgewood into a kindergarten center or a fifth grade center, as was discussed last year, a decision would have to be made no later than March, said Rodriguez.

That would give the district the 2020/2021 school year to get construction done at Edgewood and it would open as a school again in August of 2021 for the 2021/2022 school year.

And with that, here are the Tweets from Monday's presentation:

Edging Closer to a Decision