Damakant Jayshi
Amid a discussion revealing sharp differences in opinion on rebranding and cost the Wausau School Board on Monday approved closing four elementary schools, part of an overall restructuring plan.
The four schools slated for closure will be merged with neighboring schools. Grant Elementary will be closed and merged with Thomas Jefferson, Lincoln with G.D. Jones, Hewitt-Texas with Riverview and Rib Mountain with South Mountain. The merged schools could be renamed but no decision has been taken yet.
The fate of three elementary schools – John Marshall, Franklin and Hawthorn Hills – is still undecided. One of these will be closed and merged with another. A decision on the number and location of early childhood learning centers has also been left for the future.
The mergers are part of a massive restructuring plan that the school board approved in February despite mixed reaction from the community including vehement objections from a significant number of people.
According to Wausau School District officials, Lincoln will be the new home for the Montessori Charter School. At present, Montessori operates from Horace Mann Middle School. Either Hawthorn Hills or Franklin will be repurposed as an early childhood learning center and so could Rib Mountain, though the latter elementary school’s repurposing hasn’t been decided yet.
Hewitt-Texas will house the new Red Granite Charter School. The school board approved the draft of the district’s contract with the entity that will operate the charter school on Monday. The contract will be valid for five years, from July 1, 2024 to June 30, 2029, and is subject to renewal after the expiration date.
The Grant school building will be sold, district officials said. Grant and John Marshall Elementary have been designated as historic landmarks by the Wausau City Council over objections from the Wausau School District and Board. The landmarking decision for Grant in 2021 happened after voters rejected the district’s plan to raze the building. The City Council made a similar decision on John Marshall after allegations that the district was planning to demolish the 100-year-old building. The district officials denied any such plan.
On Monday, the merger proposal was approved 6-2, with two members of the 9-member school board, Pat McKee and Cory Sillars, voting no. Board President James Bouche was not present at the meeting.
Colors, mascots take up much of discussion
Differences over colors and mascots of the soon-to consolidate schools, including that of the junior and senior high schools, remain. The debate on colors took more time than any other element of the restructuring proposal discussed on Monday.
One member of the board took the district to task for presenting ideas without fully comprehending its costs, the latest example being that of color choices for schools. Former Board President Pat McKee pointed out that officials once again presented incomplete plans of the restructuring proposal that requires significant funding, without seeking board approval first.
“I don’t want to vote on something and then get pinned into something else down the road,” he said during the discussion. McKee also questioned some officials’ and board members’ previous stance that the district can’t afford maintaining 13 elementary school buildings, when 12 elementary school buildings will still be maintained under the new plan.
McKee also questioned the cost of color and mascot changes, which he said went from a half-million dollars to more than a million.
The district sought to use neutral colors until permanent choices were made, but some board members, including Board Vice President Lance Trollop, said the cost for rebranding was too high. He suggested seeking private funding to defray the cost.
There was also a discussion about seeking community input via a survey or focus groups on color changes. Board Clerk Karen Vandenberg said she had expected such an exercise to have been completed before the officials sought board approval. She said collecting input from the community now would be time-consuming.
Differences also exist over the addition of 12 classrooms at Wausau West, and the funding sources are yet to be resolved. Sillars asked Superintendent of School Keith Hilts if district officials will again ask the board to shift money again from one heading to another, to which Hilts said that aspect has already been settled.
