SUBMITTED BY DAVE PHILLIPS

Dear Board of Education:

Some late night/early morning thoughts regarding the Board meeting last night, offered with thanks for the difficult job you are doing.

1. Please consider a modified Option G. My suggestion is to move DaVinci, not to Emerson, but to Harper. My understanding from helping plan the science facilities there is that they are already high school grade facilities. Thus, no science portable would be needed, saving about $400,000 in facilities money and the need to rush far-reaching decisions to meet a deadline for ordering a portable. The ongoing savings would be the same as in Option G, plus an extra $10-15,000 not needed for moving Emerson staff and their stuff (I think that is a very low estimate by the way). You would need to move boundaries to balance junior high attendance.

2. Concerns about cutting a facility (Emerson) vs programs. Although I live near Emerson and teach there, this is not just about "don't cut me." I support the neighborhood schools philosophy in place in the district, and preserving that principle is worth some number of dollars.
"Programs" would be affected by closing Emerson. It has a unique set of programs and these would become extinct. More importantly, packing close to 1000 kids into the remaining two junior highs may look good on paper in terms of programs, but as I teacher I have seen the difference in kids' readiness and ability to approach a program when they have spent the day jostled in the halls, waiting in the lunch line for 25 minutes of a 30 minute lunch, etc.-they arrive in class not as ready to learn. There will be a cost to programs either way; it is just hard to put a
dollar value on the two junior high option.

There is another practical point that argues for giving the money for Emerson a priority over programs/teachers at this time. There is no other ready source of funding for Emerson, but teachers/programs can be added back as donations and other revenue possibilities come to
light; as I understand it, donations to Davis Schools Foundation cannot be used to keep Emerson open. The money for Emerson needs to be part of the structural, high priority budget.

3. Last, Emerson safety. The district architect said in our staff meeting a few days ago, in the presence of our facilities manager, that Emerson was structurally sound. Surely it will be as structurally safe next year as it is this year and was last year. The statement that
somehow the halls are narrower now than they were when we had almost 1000 students at Emerson just a few years ago is completely inaccurate. I'm not sure what he was thinking of (perhaps the original open plan when the school was first built?), but the implication of an unsafe
place was inaccurate and appalling.

Thank you again for your time and consideration.