All-Day K: A Case Study

NORTH KINGSTOWN- During a meeting on May 12, 2015, North Kingstown’s School Committee unanimously approved to add the estimated $550,000 to the 2015-16 school budget in order to bring “Full-Day K” to its town elementary schools.

The School Department got $1.35 million. Of that, $881,033 went toward municipal spending, and roughly $138,000 was put toward debt service.

The implementation of all-day K was announced by Superintendent Phil Auger on Thursday May 14, 2015. Auger said, “The people in the community who pushed for this at a number of both Town Council and School Committee meetings deserve a ton of credit for making this possible.

Auger then stated that he was pleased to announce to the public, back then, that the North Kingstown

School Committee voted in favor of Full-Day Kindergarten in all North Kingstown Elementary Schools, saying, “It was a long-needed addition to our programming.”

On June 28, 2016, North Kingstown held a school committee meeting to follow up on the Full-day K program. Assistant Superintendent Michele Humbyrd presented a report that showed the amount of students whose reading levels were “at target” and “exceeding target”. The data compared full-day kindergarten students in 2015 to half-day kindergarten students in 2014. It showed that both categories increased by a combined 16 percent since its application.

Humbyrd said, “The data showed that 45 percent of students “exceeded target” levels in the 2015-2016 school year, while 36 percent were “at target”.

That is an 11 percent increase for “exceeding target” and a four percent increase in “at target.” The data was gathered from a reading level assessment, in which the students go through different reading levels and complete goals. It also shows that only around 19 percent of students in the full-day K program were “below target” in 2015. That is a 15 percent decrease from the number put up by half-day kindergarteners.

“It was substantial, especially with the gains in literacy. We were beyond happy with what we were seeing,” Humbyrd said. She also went on to add that, unfortunately, there was no reliable data for the math portion of the assessment.

“A survey was conducted and its results were amazing,” Humbyrd said. The majority agreed that kindergarteners are more than ready for a longer school day. This is because a longer school day can provide the children with more hands-on learning and more social interaction. It also introduces them to a variety of different subjects, such as social studies, science and math. The teachers also provided their written comments that spoke greatly about the programs benefits.

Since the programs implementation, there is only one concern it arises, budget cost. The funding for full-day kindergarten was part of a $1.35 million bill approved by the Town Council. “After hearing about that, in mid April, groups of people began to turn out to show their support for all-day kindergarten,” Auger said. “Since the schools had asked for $1.525 million and only got $1.35 million, the School Committee had to find places to cut.” So, they let go two full-time teaching assistants.