Saugus School Committee approves free all-day kindergarten - Itemlive - Daily Item

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SAUGUS — Starting this fall, kindergarten will be free for residents of the town.

In a unanimous vote, the School Committee voted for a revised fiscal year 2022 budget that will allow for residents to send their children to kindergarten for no cost.

Committee Vice Chair Ryan Fisher said he and his fellow committee members had lobbied for the change, but encountered some early opposition.

“We put it into our first budget and we almost got laughed out of the room because it can be an expensive thing to fund,” said Fisher.

Approximately 92 percent of schools in Massachusetts offer free all-day kindergarten, but up until recently, Saugus parents had been forced to pay $2,700 for their children to attend the program. Fisher is glad that things are changing in the town’s schools.

“It’s so much better for the students,” said Fisher. “Teachers at the first-grade level say they can tell what students were enrolled in full-day (kindergarten) and what kids were not. It is something that many parents would like to take advantage of but could not afford.”

In some cases, that meant the town lost out on students who could have really made a difference in Saugus schools, in terms of excelling academically or getting involved in athletics or drama programs, Fisher explained.

While the proposal for free, all-day kindergarten was initially met with some resistance, Fisher said that in the end, getting it approved came down to money, with assistance coming from an unlikely source — the COVID-19 pandemic.

“One of the problems that we had last year with COVID was that we weren’t able to offer an all-day kindergarten program because of the COVID restrictions, so we weren’t able to charge,” said Fisher. “So, when you are dependent upon tuition it kind of puts you in a bind if you are not able to offer that program. We are now in the position where we are able to fund it.”

Fisher said the program will initially be funded through grants, but the district is hoping to carve out a piece of the budget within the next two to three years to maintain it once grant funding runs out.

It’s an accomplishment Fisher is proud of; he joked that he might have been doing cartwheels at one point during the School Committee meeting.

“This is huge,” He said. “There’s no downside other than being able to find the money for it. To be able to offer this to parents is a huge burden off (our backs) … It’s good for kids. The first-grade teachers love it because the kids are all on the same level. It’s great to keep kids in the system.”