DALTON, Mass. — Central Berkshire Regional School District regional agreement update is closer to being completed. 

 

The change to the regional agreement should not be a controversial issue because all the changes are to bring the agreement up to date on state law and how the district is currently run, School Committee Chair Richard Peters said during a Dalton Select Board meeting last month. 

 

"It's not changing any of our policies or how we're running the district or any of that," he said. 

 

The district is awaiting feedback from some of the seven member towns. Feedback received so far does not require another ad hoc committee meeting, Peters during a School Committee meeting last month. 

 

A majority of the concerns centered around the language, inclusion of the prekindergarten program, and  how votes are conducted for projects like the new Wahconah Regional High School. 

 

"Some of the towns had issues with the way the vote was done but that language has been updated a little bit," Peters said during the School Committee meeting. 

 

The agreement included some language recommended by Hinsdale that follows state law but still adheres to the town's preferences, he said, and most of the concerns, brought up by towns that commented on the agreement, can be handled internally.

 

The Dalton Select Board voted during a previous meeting to request clarification within the agreement that the pre-K program is tuition based. 

 

Peters reached out to the consultant, the Massachusetts Association of Regional Schools, regarding the board's concerns. 

 

MARS recommended not to include the stipulation that pre-K is a tuition based and that it should be left up to policy. 

 

A majority of the board members were satisfied with the organization's explanation and voted to accept this recommendation as presented. 

 

If the district is already funding the pre-K programs within its operating budget and supplementing it with grant funding and fees then there isn’t an issue with the current language, Select Board Vice Chair Dan Esko said.

 

"And who's to say that, pre-K is any less important than any other program that the district is running. I mean, I think they're all equally important," he said. "So, I don't have an issue at this point, based on the feedback or the response that I got personally. So I would support accepting things the way they were presented." 

 

The updated agreement says the district "shall be comprised of all grades from pre-kindergarten through Grade 12." The previous agreement only included kindergarten through Grade 12. 

 

"We wanted clarification on that because the current pre-K program preschool is a fee-based service. So therefore, parents who put their kids in preschool pay a fee for that service except for students with special needs which get the coverage for that service," Select Board Chair Joseph Diver said.

 

These concerns were never brought before the ad hoc committee that has been working on the agreement for the last 12 months, Diver said. The ad hoc committee has not met since the board requested clarification. 

 

The 1958 regional agreement did not include pre-school because the district did not supply that service but now it does and it does impact the operating budget, Peters said during the Select Board meeting. 

 

Depending on the special needs, there is a threshold for services and if it's above a certain amount the district does not get refunded, Peters said. 

 

This impact changes every year and will continue to affect the budget forever, unless laws are changed to not require pre-K services for special needs, he said. 

 

MARS said the language is "appropriate" because "it allows the district to offer programs to all these grade levels and it leaves the School Committee with the kind of discretion it needs to manage programs in the years ahead." 

 

That "discretion" should not be left to the School Committee because "this is the operating framework for the seven towns, and the seven towns have not relinquished this agreement to the School Committee to make those decisions," Diver said. 

 

The agreement is not between the committee and the towns, he said. It is the "agreement with all seven towns and has the operating parameters of how the School Cpmmittee and the district will operate," Diver said. 

 

The current wording "opens the door for" the committee to expand the pre-K services without a review by the seven towns, Diver said in the MARS feedback document. 

 

MARS said it is not "realistic" to manage pre-K programs with parent fees alone, and if it were possible it would not be compliant with Mass General Law. 

 

"Currently, special education for preschool-age children consists of integrated preschool classrooms and the provision of specialized services to age-appropriate qualifying students who do not attend preschool," MARS consultants Jay Barry and Steve Hemman wrote in a document responding to the board's concerns. 

 

"The District utilizes special education grants and income-based parent fees for typical learners who serve as peer partners. While the fees and the grant funds mitigate the cost of the preschool programs, the operating budget supports a portion of the total cost." 

 

Diver said he agrees but that if the agreement leaves it up to the School Committee’s discretion there needs to be clarification within the agreement on how they operate. 

 

"I'm all for preschool, don't get me wrong," Diver said. However, leaving it up to policy allows the School Committee to decide at some point whether or not to offer preschool as a fee based service, he said. 

 

According to MARS, having language that says the towns accept pre-K as a fee-based service would make it difficult to make program or cost adjustments in the future because the agreement would need to be amended. 

 

"It would be preferable to address this in district policy. It is easier to change a policy than a regional agreement," Barry and Hemman wrote. 

 

"I was satisfied with their response to our request. I don't feel that it needs to necessarily be in the agreement, but it could be part of policy" Esko said. 

 

Language requiring that the pre-K program is fee based would also complicate the required approval from state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, Barry and Hemman said.