To the editor:

As a taxpayer and parent of a young student, I want to express my concern over the process by which this start time decision was arrived at.

Supporters indicate this has been on the agenda for five years and is mentioned in minutes as far back as 2010. But tangible output from five years of discussion has a much shorter history. The first BSC (Barrington School Committee) start time presentation is dated 1 October 2015—less than a year old—and only looks at busing schedules. Hardly a ‘true study’ presenting a balanced look at the issue. It does nothing to a make a case and simply waves a bunch of 3^rd party studies representing less than 1% of US students and high schools.

Responsible decision-making requires a plan in place first and a comprehensive understanding of the implications before making a decision. The last BSC meeting saw the first request for data on after-school activity impacts. Even when there is data, it fails to meet the one goal the BSC actually articulated—no student will spend more than 30 minutes on the bus. The draft bus schedule has a first pick-up for K-3 at 7:13 am and a bus arrival at K-3 schools of 7:50--a 38 minute bus ride. Ooops!

Participation is indeed a requirement of democracy and many on both sides have made considerable effort to attend meetings—but that is not possible for everyone. The BSC has a moral responsibility to be more proactive and reach out to the community. Waiting for feedback to fall at their feet is a passive-aggressive strategy designed to limit true community-wide engagement.

Commentary from nearly every district that made a successful start time change points to the engagement of all parties—parents, students, teachers, administration—as critical to success. However the BSC made a conscious decision to exclude its stakeholders with a “task force” comprised solely of administrators. Health & Wellness committee members dismissed the idea of student/parent surveys, as they would “sabotage” the process. Is that what the BSC thinks of the parents in this district? The question to the BSC is simply: Why did you choose not to conduct parent/teacher/student surveys and actually study what this means for Barrington?

In the end, we still do not have a clear grasp of the costs and impacts of this change on OUR community. A district that measures everything with regards to student achievement has not, and cannot, articulate what it expects to achieve with this change.

Absent a formal study/position paper detailing the specific impacts and intended goals, the ultimate decision makers -- taxpayers (and in the fall the voters)—are left with very simple question: Is at least $420,000 (more costs are appearing) a fiscally responsible expense in order to attempt to solve an uncertain problem with unarticulated goals benefiting less than 50% of our students?

It all adds up to a committee derelict in its duties to serve the constituency that elected it to office.

Jason Leigh

Barrington