Waiting for summer.

At last night's school board meeting Dr. Hayes presented an update on our school facility options. I am familiar with most of the history and what's been done in the past couple of years, but what struck me is how much work has been done with Oyster River to hammer out a draft agreement. Sitting in the audience, I got the sense that all our communities will need to do is sign on the dotted line. 

Naturally, it's not that easy and there are still many hurdles to jump through. I also recently watched the ORSD March 13 meeting where the Oyster River Superintendent laid out the options for their district with the associated pros and cons. (In case you haven't been following, Oyster River is considering Newmarket, Deerfield, Barrington and Deerfield/Barrington as tuition options.) Most of this wasn't new information, but it was interesting to hear their conversation and some of their thoughts on the different communities, even though I really didn't get a sense of their preferences.

What was clear, is that Oyster River will be working on a more aggressive time frame. They will be working with UNH to conduct a survey and also having community forums to try and gauge the public support. Deerfield currently has a tuition agreement with Concord and they need to inform Concord if they will be terminating their contract by the end of the school year, so I guess that is one of the driving factors in this. 

On our end, Dr. Hayes laid out some of the next steps for Newmarket. In addition to working on this potential agreement, they are putting together a middle school budget, considering options for a middle school facility, planning community forums and continuing to work on a new construction option for our district. 

As a parent of a third grader, I realize middle school is right around the corner and I'm concerned. As I've said before, it's hard to plan for your family's future when you don't know what that future will look like. If nothing else, I hope that we will at least have some concrete information about the tuition option by the end of the school year. 

Summer can't get here soon enough.