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Schools: Out-of-District Tuition Costs To Exceed Budget

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District officials say they’re projected to spend nearly $600,000 more than budgeted this fiscal year on out-of-district tuition—a line item that can refer, in part, to when public schools pay for the education elsewhere of kids with disabilities. New Canaan Public Schools regularly sees 14 to 18 students “out-placed” each year, Assistant Superintendent of Pupil and Family Services Darlene Pianka said at Monday night’s Board of Education meeting. This year, four additional students around whom the district “had issues of concern around safety” have been “placed in therapeutic settings,” Pianka said. “And in addition to those four students, there have been a number of students in the late summer and in the early fall that the district has been in mediation with over unilateral placements that students’ parents have made—some for other than educational purposes, and others just in their requests for placement that the district disagreed with,” Pianka said at the meeting, held in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School. According to data supplied by the district at the meeting, $2.7 million had been budgeted for out-of-district tuition this year, and that’s about $579,851 short of what the schools now are expecting to spend.

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New Canaan High School Squash Requests $20,000 from District: ‘No Funding Means an End to the Program’

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Saying they need $20,000 to operate beyond this winter season or that the entire program will fold, the founders of the New Canaan High School Squash Team and participating students on Monday night called for district officials to find money to support them. Squash is an increasingly popular, fun and character-building sport that serves both boys and girls, and for the eight years that New Canaan High School’s program has been running—now with varsity club status—it’s been operated by volunteer parent Liz Schmidt, she said. Schmidt told the Board of Education at its meeting Monday that she is retiring after this season and that funds are needed to pay a coach and keep it going. No funding “means an end to the program” and “lower-than-requested funding is understandable, but would require us to cut down on the number of kids that we can admit to the program.”

“We understand that there have to be parameters on how and where money is spent,” Schmidt said during the meeting, held in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School and attended by dozens of the 80 students who play on the Rams teams, as well as several squash parents. “However, we would like to respectfully suggest that perhaps the parameters for funding New Canaan High School sports be looked at.

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Board of Ed Re-Elects Chair and Vice Chair, Split on Secretary

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The Board of Education on Monday night re-elected its current chair and vice chair to another year in those offices, and was unable to decide immediately who would serve as the group’s secretary. The group now has 30 days to decide who will fill the role, and can take up the matter at its next meeting (Nov. 17), Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi said. During the meeting, held in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School, Chair Hazel Hobbs and Vice Chair Scott Gress were re-elected 8-0 to those roles, with one abstention in each case (Alison Bedula). Both Sheri West and current Board of Ed Secretary Dionna Carlson were put forward for the role of secretary, and each garnered four votes.

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‘Tight Timelines’ Set to Kick-Start $2 Million Saxe Auditorium Renovation

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With an eye on securing construction funds for fiscal year 2016, the group that’s overseeing the renovation of the Saxe Middle School auditorium is working against “tight timelines” that will see draft plans completed by the end of January, officials say. Members of the Saxe Auditorium Building Committee are meeting weekly now as well as conducting site visits in New Canaan, Darien and Westport so that by the next budget cycle they can come before the town with more details and tap the $2 million earmarked for the work starting next summer, New Canaan Public Schools Interim Director of Finance and Operations Nancy Harris said at the Sept. 8 Board of Education meeting. “We have to have a comprehensive preliminary budget, which means there has to be a draft of a design, so that kicks us into high gear,” Harris said at the meeting, held in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School. “At our opening meeting, we really set some very tight timelines,” she said.

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Group Forms to Oversee Saxe Auditorium Renovation

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New Canaan this week took a big step toward the widely anticipated renovation of Saxe Middle School’s aging auditorium, with the creation of a volunteer panel to oversee the project. The Saxe Auditorium Building Committee includes elected and district officials as well as private citizens. The town approved $175,000 for project designs in the current fiscal year, with $2 million earmarked for the actual work in fiscal year 2016, budget documents show. Part of the original 1957 building, the Saxe auditorium received a “poor” rating in an August 2013 facilities survey. Interim Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi described the auditorium as both an instructional and performance space “and it hasn’t been updated, maintained or renovated in an awfully long time.”

“We’ve got a situation where the seats are broken and the space itself is no longer serving the needs of the school or the community,” Luizzi told NewCanaanite.com.