Full Day Kindergarten and District Office Bond Project 2025
Tuesday March 11th, 2025 Vote
Starting Full Day Kindergarten and Ending the District Office Lease
Click Info Graphic Below for Details
Ful Day K and District Office Bond Final Draft Infogrpahic 1 3 25.pdf1) The project makes space for Full Day Kindergarten at 80% less of the cost than last year's bond project.
2) The project places the district office in existing school space at Moose Hill for 74% less of the cost than a new building.
What questions do you need answered on this new project?
Why are both these projects a pressing need?
#1 - We have fallen behind the rest of New Hampshire and the Country in terms of providing Full Day Kindergarten as an option to families.
#2 - The taxpayers have asked the School District to save money by finding an affordable, permanent place for the School District Office.
On I-Ready testing, our local assessment choice for grades 1 to 8; our 1st grade students are consistently behind NH and National outcomes. This is the only grade level we fall behind state and national outcomes. We need more time to build a stronger academic and social foundation for our students in 1st grade and beyond.
Current District Office Lease Building
6A Kitty Hawk Landing
If this project is approved, we would start saving $263K in Lease costs annually by 2026-27.
This project pays for renovations ($1.63M) at Moose Hill to create office space for the District Office staff.
This project also pays to add 8 excellent modular classrooms at Matthew Thornton, South School, and North School to have the room for Full Day Kindergarten at all three schools.
Over the Summer and Fall of 2022, after the School District received their extensive report on the building needs within the system, the School Board mapped out a tentative timeline for addressing those needs over many decades. The new bond project for 2025 is an update to that process to show the voters we listened to the feedback from last year around cost - trying to find an less expensive path forward to still address our building needs right now.
Will this new project save on overall costs over the life of the bond? YES!
We will save $263K a year on lease costs for the current district office starting in 2026-27 after the move is made.
We start saving $283K a year in mid-day bus we will no longer need runs in 2026-27 without a half day kindergarten model.
We will receive additional state aid in the first year of full day kindergarten implementation of $1000 per student.
By 2027-28, we will receive about $2219 more in state aid per full time kindergarten student which we estimate to be about $478K in increased aid by that year.
Between the third and fourth year of this project the savings and increased aid will be more than the costs. For that reason, over the life of the bond we estimate this project would save the taxpayers $2.2M over 15 years.
What will this new bond project cost?
Other Costs Figures to Know
Initial interest payment in the first year: $226,000
Ongoing payment with 15year bond and 3.46% interest rate: $759K yearly payment
Average yearly tax impact: $0.12
We estimate that we will need to add two more professional staff by 2026-27 to implement Full Day Kindergarten for a yearly cost of $183K.
What other Projects did the School District research and the School Board consider before arriving at this solution?
1) Return the same project from the March 2024 vote to the community in March of 2025 for another vote. With construction costs increasing ($36.9M) and two classes of smaller enrollment now in kindergarten and 1st grade, the School Board chose not to bring this same project back to the voters at this time.
2) Bring a "Scaled Back" Moose Hill Project to the voters. This proposal was studied from June 2024 to September of 2024 and the School District worked with architects and a construction firm to estimate costs. This "scaled back" version was built around smaller enrollment projections and not bringing back the same level of investment at Moose Hill as the original project. The School Board chose to not bring this project back to the voters because of the higher costs ($19.2M) that the current project being proposed and the "scaled back" project did not address the district office lease issue.
3) Place Full Day Kindergarten at Moose Hill and within the space that exists at North School and South School as well. The School Board chose to not pursue this option to make sure we had a consistent elementary school model across the district. In this plan, North and South School would be grades K to 5, Matthew Thornton would be grades 1 to 5, and kindergarten Matthew Thornton students would remain at Moose Hill along with many of our self-contained programs.
4) Move the LEEP Preschool program and the District Office to existing commercial space in Londonderry, then expand Moose Hill to have Full Day Kindergarten with a smaller building addition. This proposal was studied from July of 2024 to September of 2024 and the School District worked with architects and a construction firm to estimate costs. The School Board chose to not bring this project to the voters because of the higher costs ($20.8M) for construction and need to hire additional staff (+$1M in annual costs) to move the Preschool and reproduce our district wide self contained programs at Moose Hill and the commercial property.
5) Move the LEEP Preschool program to Londonderry High School and use Moose Hill for Full Day Kindergarten with a smaller building addition. This proposal was studied from June of 2024 to August of 2024. The School Board chose to not bring this project to the voters because of the problems of housing the Preschool on the LHS campus and this option not having a solution for the District Office Lease.
6) Move the 5th grade to Londonderry Middle School then place Full Day Kindergarten into North School, South School, and Matthew Thornton. This proposal was studied from June of 2024 to August of 2024. The School Board chose to not bring this project to the voters because of the problems of having enough space at LMS for grades 5 to 8 and the educational and social concerns for that model of schooling as a district.
7) Build modular classrooms at Moose Hill to accommodate Full Day Kindergarten. This option was studied from July 2024 to September of 2024. The School Board chose to not bring this project to the voters because it would be more expensive than the current proposal and did not have a solution for the district office lease issue.
Below are links to all the research and work done on these 7 other options and the eventual solution done over the summer and fall of 2024.