1 Golden Bomber Dr.
Ilion, NY 13357
Phone: 315.894.9934
Fax: 315.894.2716
Superintendent
District undertakes school merger study
Understanding where we are and where we are heading…
By now, most Ilion residents have likely heard something about a school merger study. Depending on your understanding of what has taken place and the process that lies ahead, you might be feeling excited, concerned, or even angry. The Board of Education wants everyone to fully understand what is happening. Over the next several months, as the district explores the possibility of a merger, residents can be confident that the board will communicate everything that is taking place and that no action will take place without the community’s consent. The study has just one purpose, to help us discover whether a merger is in the best interests of our students and our taxpayers—or not.
The process formally began last spring when the Ilion Board of Education authorized Superintendent Cosimo Tangorra by resolution to participate in a New York State Department of State Local Government Efficiency Grant program with representatives from the Frankfort-Schuyler, Herkimer, and Mohawk school districts. The purpose of the grant is the study the feasibility of merging the districts’ programs and services.
School board representatives and the superintendents of the four districts met to discuss how to move forward with a study to explore the possible reorganization of the districts. In October, the Ilion Board of Education joined the other districts in approving SES Educational Consultants to conduct the study.
Since then, each district appointed one board member and the superintendent to an eight-person steering committee. The committee will provide feedback and suggestions to help guide the consultants throughout the study.
In the near future, each board will select 15 interested community members to serve on the Community Advisory Committee. These 60 people will play a key role in sharing the desires and concerns of their communities to the consultants as the study proceeds. The committee will also help relay the progress of the study back to the communities.
Now begins the hard work of collecting and analyzing data. With the help of our Steering Committee and the Community Advisory Committee, the SES study group will look at our schools and our communities and help us picture how a possible merged school might look.
Once the study is completed in September 2011, our board of education and our community will carefully review the results and decide if a merger makes sense.
Residents will surely have questions covering everything from why we agreed to the study to how the process takes place. Many of those questions may be answered in the Question and Answer section.
