No all-day kindergarten for Dist. 203

Costs and lack of space will likely keep Naperville Unit District 203 from adding an all-day kindergarten program to its elementary schools in the near future despite its neighboring district doing so.

Superintendent Alan Leis and the school board addressed the issue at Monday night's board meeting in response to questions from parents who hoped that since Indian Prairie Unit District 204 recently added such a program, District 203 would follow suit.

"Our student population is different than some of those even immediately surrounding us and what we ask as a board and as a community is that we're evaluating who our students are and what are the best interventions for our population of students," board President Suzyn Price said.

Last month Indian Prairie, which includes portions of Naperville, Aurora, Bolingbrook and Plainfield, approved adding an all-day program in all of its elementary schools next fall that will be open to all students. School officials there cited research showing the benefits of early education.

District 203 currently only offers all-day kindergarten to a select group of special education and English Language Learner students, which is funded through grants.

"It's generally been believed all-day kindergarten is most beneficial for students who start a little behind," Leis said.

Cost would be an issue if the district wanted to begin an all-day program for all students. While the state's funding formula works in Indian Prairie's favor and will cover the entire $5 million cost of the program, that's not the case for its neighbors. Because the tax base is higher in District 203, the state would only cover about 15 percent of the costs of the program.

Facilities would be another hurdle to overcome. While there may be space available in some elementary schools, that isn't the case for all of them.

"I have a personal belief we can't look or shouldn't look at all-day kindergarten unless we're able to add it across the district, unless we could do it in a way that wouldn't displace art or music or some of the special (programs) we have in this district," Leis said.

Indian Prairie board member Jeannette Clark expressed similar concerns last month about a space crunch in her district but all of the principals said they could make room and the rest of the board decided the pros outweighed the cons.