(Clarinda) -- Clarinda school officials call it "frank conversations" when discussing how the latest open enrollment changes could affect school districts.
During its regular meeting Wednesday evening, the Clarinda School Board discussed the removal of the March 1 deadline for students to declare their intention to switch school districts, which Governor Kim Reynolds signed into law earlier this week. The measure was included in House File 2589, which passed on the final day of the legislative session. With the deadline gone, Board Member Paul Boysen says the district should look deeper into why students and families are coming and going from the district.
"Is it something we're not doing, or something we're doing -- are we having staff issues, administration issues," said Boysen. "Just all kinds of stuff that can cause these people to leave. Because, anymore that's a good chunk of money, and if you look at that graph, we're bumping back up again."
Superintendent Designee Lance Ridgely says he and other school officials have had "frank" conversations on how the change could impact school districts in terms of determining enrollment numbers and receiving supplemental state aid -- which is a per-pupil-driven formula. But, in his experience, he says there seems to be a common theme among why students open enroll.
"Typically, what I would do when I would receive an open enrollment out, I would call the family and just have a quick conversation of 'help me understand why you're doing this," said Ridgely. "And I would say 75% of the time, it was convenience."
Nancy McKinnon is the director of finance and board secretary for Clarinda. Once the COVID-19 pandemic hit, McKinnon says a good amount of the students lost to open enrollment were to various online options.
"A third of our open enrollment out has increased to C.A.M., which is an online program and because of COVID we've had several go that direction and they've remained there," said McKinnon. "Shenandoah has I.G.N.I.T.E., which is an online program, and we've lost some to that. We've got some students that are going to Lenox because they preferred a home schooling but there's an online program in Lenox that they've liked and that's what they've gone to."
Since his time on the board, Boysen says there have already been some open enrollment requests that ran "afoul" with the March 1 deadline. However, he says the district should be prepared for anything should those requests continue to grow.
"With that (deadline) being removed, it makes me think we might be seeing more of that, or we may not, you just never know, but I think we should be prepared," said Boysen. "Because if you have a whole flock of 15 people come in at once and say they want to enroll, take that times the about $7,000 per kid, that's a pretty good chunk of change."
Under the new law, Boysen says there doesn't appear to be many ways the district could potentially deny a request one way or the other.
Ridgely also informed the board that a resolution could be put in place, granting the superintendent the ability to act on open enrollment requests and complete them in a timely manner.
