(W)e are adjusting to create some other flexibility… within the 2B bucket.”

KBA's Kate Jessup

Building consensus

KBA consultant Kate Jessup spent much of the Oct. 18 meeting trying to get school building committee members to build consensus on a variety of statements.

She spoke about the need to have a “swing space” — a building where students could go while their school is under construction. Jessup said the Primrose Hill School site was the only property that could be used as a swing space.

School building committee members asked if the Sowams School site could be used, but Jessup said it was not big enough. A committee member challenged that, but Jessup said the sites had all been measured. She could not provide the immediate size data, however.

Jessup spent time trying to establish consensus among committee members on Sowams School being the least ideal location for a school site. Time and again she asked committee members to agree with the statements, although members, at times, were reluctant to do so.

Jessup also spoke about school enrollment projections and a calculation called functional utilization. She said school districts in the western part of the state are seeing a decline in enrollment, but the East Bay was witnessing increases. A school building committee member said the enrollment growth projected in Barrington only equated to one half of 1 percent.

Building maintenance costs surfaced during the discussion, as did statements trying to build consensus about pre-kindergarten. Jessup asked if committee members supported expansion of pre-kindergarten, but school officials had some concerns with the statements.

Committee members asked for maintenance cost information from the new middle school so they could better understand what costs might be like with the newly constructed buildings.

Option 2B is dead.

At a school building committee meeting on Tuesday, Oct. 25, members came to a consensus — there was no specific vote — to abandon the heavily debated Option 2B of the schools master facilities plan. Instead, building committee members are now focused on two new school building projects or “refined pathways”: Option 2B-2 and Option 2B-4.

During the last 10 minutes of a two-hour building committee meeting on Oct. 18, the consultant for the district, Kaestle Boos Associates, unveiled four new construction options. 

• Option 2B-2 calls for two pre-kindergarten to Grade 2 schools and one larger Grades 3 to 5 school. 

• Option 2B-4, nicknamed the “Sister Schools” option, calls for two pre-kindergarten to Grade 2 schools and two Grade 3 to 5 schools.

Both plans are a shift from the original Option 2B, which called for two Grade 1 to 5 schools and an early learning center (pre-K and kindergarten) at Nayatt School. The decision to move away from Option 2B follows criticism from a parents group and some town and school officials. Some residents are calling for the district to preserve the neighborhood elementary school model.

The creation of new building options may be warmly received by critics of Option 2B, but Barrington School Committee member Patrick McCrann, who also sits on the school building committee, said the new options should be shared with the whole school committee as they are a significant shift from the previous plan. 

“There needs to be a public acknowledgment that things have changed,” McCrann said during a recent interview. “Someone has to notify the school committee that the options have been changed. They’re not the same options. It’s not the 2B option.”

McCrann said members of the school building committee came to a consensus at the Oct. 25 meeting to move away from Option 2B in favor of some other new options presented by the consulting firm KBA. 

“2B was the first one out,” he said. “2B is dead.”

The ‘2B bucket’

Kate Jessup, a consultant with KBA, offered a different perspective during the Oct. 18 school building committee meeting. She said the new options were “refined pathways.”

“After all the discussion we’ve had, all that we’ve heard from the community, I want to be very clear about it, we are not moving away from the 2B pathway,” Jessup said duding the Oct. 18 meeting. 

“… we are adjusting to create some other flexibility… within the 2B bucket.”

Some people are the meeting argued that the new options may carry the same “2B” title, they were in fact very different plans. Jessup contended that the plan is still the 2B pathway. She said officials had looked at shifting the grade groupings, a move that appeared to garner support from the district’s central office. Officials including assistant superintendent Paula Dillon said that teacher certification is grouped Pre-K to Grade 2, and Grades 3 to 5. 

The shift came as a surprise to McCrann, however. He said the consultant, KBA, and building committee leadership had expressed reluctance to making any significant changes to Option 2B prior to the Oct. 18 meeting. But during that meeting, Jessup and KBA returned with a presentation for the school building committee members detailing four new “refined pathways.” 

A week later, on Oct. 25, Jessup returned to the school building committee with a presentation offering more details about the newly refined pathways. 

“All the slides — except for the first one — had at least one error,” McCrann said, adding that the mistakes were indicative of the process which he claims has been rushed. 

The pace of the process was made clear during the Oct. 18 meeting where Jessup pressed committee members for consensus or agreement on a series of statements regarding a variety of different subjects. Some committee members had questions or concerns about the statements, but Jessup asked for them to work past that to find some agreement. She also referenced a timeline that demanded quicker approvals. Jessup told committee members that if they did not complete the submission to the Rhode Island Department of Education by February, they would need to start the whole process over again. 

“I don’t want to spend too much time on this,” she said during the Oct. 18 meeting.

Jessup also did not reveal the refined pathways until the last 10 minutes of the two-hour Oct. 18 meeting. Just moments after presenting the refined pathways and right as the public comment period was about to begin, Jessup left the meeting. (KBA’s Larry Trim remained present for the entire meeting.)

Had Jessup stayed at the meeting a little longer, she would have heard a mix of comments from the public. TJ Peck, who is running as an Independent candidate for the school committee, said it was troubling that the timeline was being rushed for no reason. He urged school building committee members to slow down the process. Maura McCrann, wife of Patrick McCrann, said the new options were a significant shift from “Option 2B.” She said there has been no real community engagement with the new options, and committee members needed more than one week to consider them. Adam Mileikowsky offered an opposing viewpoint and wanted the school building committee to make a decision quickly and move forward.

Patrick McCrann, later in the meeting, said the statements offered by Jessup were “pretty leading.” He said he wanted to spend more time discussing the new options and wanted more information and data.

Some of that data arrived at the Oct. 25 meeting, McCrann said. For example, KBA provided updated cost estimates — the work is now expected to cost 30 to 40 percent more per square foot. Construction costs that had been expected to cost between $400 to $500 per square foot were now closer to $700 or $800. 

No votes had been taken on the new options yet.