With the declining enrollment,under utilized schools and underlying financial issues, it is evident Neshaminy needs to take action.

The district seeks to add full-day kindergarten in all elementary schools, providing a head start to education and potentially saving parents thousands of dollars in half-day daycare.

With any improvement, there will always be a price to pay. In Neshaminy’s case, where the funds for the full-day kindergarten will come from is the problem. The idea laid on the table is for Neshaminy to self-fund by cutting the means in other places.

Recently closing Walter Miller became that option. Closing a school is always heartbreaking to all, but when a facility is both under utilized and in disrepair, it is hard to find a better option.

Redistricting is just another complication of this process; students may be displaced and limiting displacement is a crucial factor in these decisions.

Now, Neshaminy School District has eight elementary schools and one Intermediate Unit (IU) facility. The locations of these schools are not exactly convenient, as some are scattered and students are forced to attend excessively distant schools. Over the past few years, Oliver Heckman, Lower Southampton and Walter Miller have been the elementary schools named as possible closures. Just this past month, Walter Miller Elementary School was voted to be closed, as voted 8-1 on Feb. 25 by board members. Fortunately, at the March 10 Ad Hoc Committee meeting, a 3-0, vote put the decision to close Miller on hold.

Closing Walter Miller is certainly not the best option for Neshaminy School District. It would needlessly displace the schooling structure and would take years to straighten out the issues it would leave us with, whether it be redistricting or over-capacitating.

Currently, Tawanka is in use for the IU students. This facility would be the best option to lease out of the district. It is currently in the best standing condition of district schools. Its estimated maintenance comes to over $3 million dollars. It is a large facility and is in a great location for any company.

Samuel Everett Elementary School is the best option for students usage by IU students. It is an under utilized school that is located almost directly between Walter Miller and Albert Schweitzer. It currently has 325 enrolled students that could easily be redistricted between Schweitzer and Miller. Thus, we would solve the controversy of closing an elementary school, yet, still putting a facility to good use.

If the district were able to meet the funds for full-day kindergarten, we would still be left with one issue. The capacity of all elementary schools would go over by at least 5 percent, not including any possible students from private schools that may switch to Neshaminy. It is mathematically impossible to go around the over-capacity issue.

It has been suggested that the only reasonable way to solve this is to move 5th graders up to the middle schools. It is believed that 5th graders are not psychologically ready for the middle schools. “It just isn’t safe for 9 and 10 year old kids to be going to the middle schools; they already are growing up to fast,” said Colleen Finley, a teacher at Miller.

All editors who voted believe that, so long as it is possible to keep the 5th graders in a format similar to elementary school, moving them would be acceptable, as it seems necessary, although it is not optimal. The transition may even be better. If they only switch teachers once or twice –similar to what they do already in 5th grade—they will adjust gradually to the change. Floor plans of the middle schools could prevent this from happening, so this plan could take years to perfect; schools could be correctly modified to fit the needs of these students. No matter the case, it can be agreed upon the most important aspect of this modification would be what best fits the students.

There is no easy answer. Closing a school is never the best option. Nobody wants the institution they attended and grew up as a child with to be closed; it is heartbreaking. Yet, no matter the case, for better opportunities there will be important aspects that we must give up, and complex factors to weigh in. Perhaps the aforementioned plan, too, could be part of the discussion.