Leading Supporters of Re-Opening Red Cedar Explain Reasons

They have generally been less vocal than opponents at recent East Lansing School Board meetings and heated social media discussions, but there are numerous supporters of the movement to reopen Red Cedar Elementary as a pre-K-5 school this coming fall. ELi asked local leaders among them to share their reasoning. We relay here the comments of four East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) Board members, East Lansing’s Mayor Pro Tem, and a former member of City Council who is a member of the Red Cedar neighborhood.

Kathleen Boyle believes that every neighborhood deserves its own school. Boyle is a former East Lansing City Council member and a member of the Red Cedar neighborhood.

“I think the presence of a neighborhood school adds a lot to each neighborhood and helps it thrive. The more neighborhood schools we can support, the better it is for our city,” Boyle told ELi for this story. “The reopening of Red Cedar will provide the best location for the residents of the University's student housing for families, and that population, which adds so much to ELPS, is best served by a school within walking distance. The development of a STEAM program will be a benefit to our school district.” (STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math.)

Boyle trusts the School Board to move forward with “due consideration to students, finances, educational programming and our community in making their decision on whether or not to reopen the school.”

East Lansing’s Mayor Pro Tem Ruth Beier, an economist for the Michigan Education Association (the teachers’ union), also supports reopening the Red Cedar School building either for pre-school, K-5 programming, or as an administrative building.

“It was a mistake to close Red Cedar Elementary,” Beier wrote in an email to ELi. “As I understand it, the school was full and physically in better shape than most of the other elementary schools. In addition, closing Red Cedar resulted in overcrowding in Glencairn, a building that is in much worse shape than the Red Cedar building.”

She added that the East Lansing District is growing and the general fund is balanced and stable. If the District wants to save money, she suggests they look into “renegotiating [the District’s] privatized transportation contract.” She says that privatizing bussing, rather than saving money, has increased costs substantially, up 62% from 2009-10 to 2014-15 (an increase in costs of about $400,000 per year).

The lead proponent on the ELPS School Board for re-opening the Red Cedar School is Kath Edsall. She made the motion to create the committee to determine what time of programming would take place at Red Cedar. She says the timing of the project is necessary to get the plans in place before new housing for student families at MSU opens this August.

“The reason for the closure by the School Board at the time was that there was no evidence that MSU had any intention to rebuild housing for the student families currently housed at Spartan Village” Edsall told ELi. “This August, MSU will open housing for student families a short 5-minute walk from Red Cedar school. This population of student families are typically limited in their transportation options and as such access is of utmost importance. Since Red Cedar is currently vacant, the new housing presents an opportunity to provide access for these students and bring innovation to our District, something I have been talking about since starting on the Board over three years ago,” she said.

Edsall also fears that those who are against the project will gain more momentum if the process takes place on a longer time table: “As we have received feedback from the community about the timeline, I realize this seems aggressive, however, politics being what they are, the longer we wait, the more time it gives the naysayers to tear this opportunity down.”

Edsall says that, “Sadly, those individuals are more concerned about property values and access for their children than they are about innovation, creativity and opportunity for all and no reassurances that we do not intend to close any other school to do this, is sufficient. This is an amazing opportunity for our district and hopefully, will help us retain some of the families who go out side of our District for alternatives we do not offer.”

Edsall also clarified that while she has said no “redistricting” of neighborhoods-to-schools would take place, what she meant is that the “old Glencairn boundaries will not change. In particular, there is no plan to move Chesterfield Hills into the Red Cedar catchment area.”

Board President Nell Kuhnmuench has voted with Edsall in support with all the motions relating to reopening Red Cedar this fall. But as the process moves forward, she says wants to assure all parents, educators and staff that they are being heard by the Board members, who are working hard to gather the data to answer the questions they have as well as questions from the community.

“I honestly believe everybody is listening to the public. The information is being developed and will be given serious consideration,” Kuhnmuench said. “It was not my intent to have this divisiveness. We are trying to move forward thoughtfully and realistically. We will continue to listen and talk about this issue.”

Trustee Karen Hoene echoed Kuhnmuench in her remarks to ELi, seeking to assure parents, teachers, staff and concerns citizens that the Board is hearing all of their concerns. She was among those who fought the initial closure of the Red Cedar School and expresses surprise that people weren’t expecting this. She has voted in favor of re-opening this fall.

“Red Cedar was and still is a great asset to our District and the longer it sits empty, the more potential for innovation and improvement to our District we waste,” Hoene told ELi for this report. “The further division of our community was certainly not the intention we had when we set out to determine how Red Cedar can best benefit our School District. In fact, our goal was always to find a way to re-open Red Cedar without closing any other elementary schools, so I must admit that the strong opposition came as a bit of a surprise to me.”

Hoene emphasized that she “remains flexible and will to consider adjusted time lines and/or alternate ideas about the future use of Red Cedar if that is what seems best for our District as a whole.”

Asked for her take, Trustee Erin Graham offered a historical perspective on the issue. She stated that the Board has been working under the assumption that Red Cedar would be reopened in Fall 2016 ever since, in September 2015, Trustee Edsall made a motion to determine which programming would best suit the school.

“At that time all Trustees and the public had access to the language that she indicated she would offer up as a motion for a Board vote at the regular Board meeting. Public comment then occurred, with the only members of the public speaking about the proposed motion indicating their support,” Graham told ELi.

The Board action two weeks later to create a committee to study programming options also indicated that Red Cedar would be open in Fall 2016, and that motion passed unanimously.

The committee came back with the recommendation of reopening Red Cedar as a preschool for 2016-17 and as a pre-K through 5 grade STEAM school in Fall 2017. On December 14, the Board accepted the STEAM portion of the recommendation but went with the original opening date for the entire school of Fall 2016.

“When I voted on December 14th to accept the recommendation of the Committee for Educational Programming as to the kind of innovative programming that should be at Red Cedar Elementary I did so with the understanding that there were still a lot of questions we needed to answer,” Graham said. “I did so with the understanding that if we could not get satisfactory answers to those questions, we could revisit the timeline as well as whether and how to move forward.”

To that end, the Board plans to discuss the timeline with administration officials and consultant at their working session at 7 p.m. on Monday, February 1.

For ELi’s previous reporting on this issue, see:

Red Cedar Decision Stirs Strong Feelings in Community

East Lansing Board of Education to Discuss Reopening Red Cedar

Timeline for Red Cedar School Re-Opening Released