Private schools see spike in interest with Beverly budget crisis

By Cate Lecuyer
Staff writer

April 11, 2008 06:00 am

—

BEVERLY — Private schools in the area are seeing a big increase in admissions calls since Superintendent James Hayes announced his plan on March 26 to lay off teachers and close two elementary schools.

"Ever since the news broke out in Beverly, our phone has been ringing every day," said Pat Adams, a secretary at St. Mary Star of the Sea School on Chapman Street.

Brookwood School in Manchester got five to 10 calls last week, and two Beverly residents filed applications.

Last Monday, Clark School in Danvers began placing advertisements in newspapers in preparation for its open house.

"Worried about the future of your school?" the ad asks. "We have room for your child to learn."

"We're always looking at the community around us," said Lisa Kosan of Beverly, the school's marketing and public relations director. On Saturday, four people requested more information from the school's Web site.

Nancy Carpenter, who has a daughter in first grade at Cove School, said she's looking into two private schools — Stoneridge Children's Montessori School in Beverly and Clark School, where her sixth-grade son is already a student. He transferred out of the public schools before the budget cuts were announced.

"He didn't get the attention he needed, and he didn't connect with the teachers," Carpenter said, noting that he had been in a class of 30 students at Briscoe Middle School. "It's bad enough there as it is."

Hayes' proposal to lay off 61 employees, including a team of teachers at the middle school, would make conditions even worse, she said.

Under the superintendent's plan, Cove and McKeown elementary schools would close, and their students would be redistricted to other schools, increasing class sizes at all of them. Cove would become an early childhood education center, and McKeown would be turned into an alternative secondary school for special-needs students.

The plan would close a $2.6 million gap between spending and revenue in next year's proposed budget.

The plan has outraged parents, however, and prompted the City Council to approve the city's first Proposition 21/2 override election on June 3. If it passes, the override would raise $2.5 million from increased taxes to keep the school district the same as it is now.

Carpenter, a nurse, said she would rather pay an extra $200 a year in taxes to keep her daughter at Cove School than spend $18,000 a year to send her to private school. Carpenter is already working extra shifts in an emergency room to pay for her son's tuition.

"If I had enough money to put her in Clark next year, I would," she said of her daughter. "But I can't afford it. I'm just hoping the override passes."

Yet depending on what happens with the Beverly public schools, she may find a way, she said, and she is still looking into private options.

Increased interest in private schools is unusual around this time of year because the admissions process is wrapping up. While some schools have open enrollment, which means students can enroll at any time in the year, many private schools have already sent home acceptance letters, and the deadline was yesterday for parents to confirm whether their children would be attending.

In many cases, that means that students accepted now would be placed on a waiting list for September.

Many parents have criticized Hayes for announcing the plan so late in the game. Hayes has said he made it public soon after the administration came up with it.

In the meantime, some families are still requesting information and filling out applications.

"They want to know what else is out there," Kosan said.

Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.