Westmoreland School Expansion Could Create Full-Day Kindergarten Space

The Fair Lawn Board of Education is making plans for an addition at Westmoreland Elementary School which could open space for full-day kindergarten across the district.

Engineering firm LAN Associates will prepare a grant proposal for the district for the addition, which could include as many as six classrooms, four small group instruction rooms and one office, board members said during a buildings and grounds committee meeting Monday. Fair Lawn Schools were previously authorized by the state to add nearly 11,000 square-feet of space and the state announced $425 million in grants for school construction this year, according to LAN President Kenneth Karle.

The expansion would both create much-needed space at the school — where some rooms are simultaneously used for several uses and some services have to be provided in the principal's office or faculty lounge — and create enough new room to move more of the district's special education classes there. The centralization of special education would open enough room in the other elementary schools for a possible future full-day kindergarten, according to Superintendent Bruce Watson.

A new expanded BSI kindergarten program is slated to start this year for Fair Lawns students in need of extra instruction. Board members also recently voiced their support for full-day kindergarten for all students, despite the failure of a previous referendum to fund the program.

Even if Fair Lawn is awarded a grant for the Westmoreland expansion, a full-day kindergarten program could be costly, according to Watson. Sixty percent of the funding for the addition — part of which is needed anyway because of the overcrowding — would need to be paid for by the district, and the program itself could cost an additional $672,000 per year to run. The program may need to be paid for through a voter referendum because of rising costs of salaries, insurance and other expenses.

"It's not easy to just say, 'I want to go full time,' and go ahead and do it," Watson said.

If a referendum were passed, the full-day kindergarten program could start as soon as September 2015, Watson said.

The board is expected to vote on the application for the Westmoreland expansion grant and another grant for a project to replace windows, roofs and floors across the district at their next meeting August 29.