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School committee approves continued participation in school choice, citing enrollment and budget benefits
Summary
The North Attleborough Public Schools Committee voted to participate in school choice, keeping open limited slots by grade and applying roughly $175,000 of choice revenue to the district budget. District staff said school-choice revenue has supported class offerings and helped equalize enrollment across schools.
The North Attleborough Public Schools Committee voted to approve participation in the district's school choice program, opening limited slots at each grade level and applying choice revenue to the district budget.
Superintendent Antonucci told the committee members they would be asked to vote on school choice and thanked district data analyst Liz Bonin for producing the enrollment materials in the meeting backup. "Thank you so much to Liz Bonin. Behind the scenes, she is our data person, our statistician," Antonucci said.
The committee approved a participation plan that, as described in the backup, would keep five open slots per grade at the elementary and middle school levels and 10 open slots in each high school grade (9'12). The district clarified that the 10 high school slots are a cap on open seats per grade and would not be added on top of existing enrollments; for example, if nine students are already enrolled in grade 9, only one of the 10 open slots would remain available.
District staff said they are using school-choice placements to balance class sizes across schools. The packet and discussion noted Tri-County enrollments are declining while North Attleborough is drawing some students back through choice; staff said that has helped the district maintain class offerings without cutting sections. Staff also said the revenue from school choice this year was scheduled at $324,000, including special-education reimbursements, and that the budget presented earlier this year included a $175,000 offset from the school-choice balance.
A motion "to approve the participation in school choice as recommended by Superintendent Antonucci" was moved, seconded and approved. The transcript records the outcome as "Motion carries 5 and a." The committee recorded the motion as approved.
Committee members did not propose amendments to the participation numbers during the discussion recorded in the transcript. Staff said almost every grade level still had one or two slots available under the proposed plan and described how new entrants would be assigned to schools with lower enrollments to equalize class sizes.
The committee did not record further formal directions in the transcript regarding future adjustments to slot numbers or reporting requirements; the discussion focused on current-year enrollment projections and the use of school-choice revenue in the district budget.
