Days after North Bennington voters agreed to close their public school and establish an independent school in its place, a
petition is circulating to recall the vote.
The bid to close the North
Bennington Graded School won by a much smaller margin than last March, when
voters agreed to close the school by July of this year.
School consolidation is a
growing concern for a number of Vermont communities, and that’s the case in Bennington where voters will head to the polls next month to
decide the fate of one public school.
Lawmakers hope a new approach to getting more Vermont school districts to merge will help augment an
earlier effort to cut down on the number of school boards. Education
officials argue mergers would result in better governance, more student
opportunity and possible cost savings.
North Bennington residents voted last March to close their public elementary school. They hoped an
application for a new independent school would be approved by the state Board of Education
at its May meeting. But instead the application was tabled.
Officials in Hartford have ended a long debate about whether to save money
by consolidating its three elementary schools and have instead decided to go
after new revenue by attracting tuition-paying students to the high school.
Residents of Wilmington and Whitingham voted yesterday to consolidate their
elementary schools. The two southern Vermont towns, a dozen miles apart, merged their middle and
high schools in 2003 and formed the Twin Valley School
District.
School leaders around Vermont are being encouraged under
a new voluntary merger law to study forming larger, unified school districts
that could save money and offer more opportunities for students.