WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) —At Tuesday’s agenda review meeting, the New Hanover County Board of Education discussed possible options after funding cuts to PreK.
Superintendent Chris Barnes sat down with the PreK directors and members of the senior staff to look at possible solutions.
They came up with seven options to present to the board.
- Stop Pre-K transportation and shift that money towards refilling classroom slots
- Go back to the commissioners and tell them they need the slots back
- Turn towards endowment and ask them to make up the deficit in the funding
- Carry the positions another year using the fund balance money, further depleting the fund balance
- Offer paid slots to families that don’t quality for Pre-K and use that money to offset the loss of classroom slots
- Use the ‘carryover’ money from the Title 1 money from the government
- Move Mary Washington Howe Pre-K Center to Dorothy B. Johnson Pre-K center and sell the Howe property. Use that money partially for the fund balance as well as making elementary schools compatible with Pre-K classrooms.
Board members Josie Barnhart said she didn’t anticipate this but was looking to make the best of the situation given…