NORTH SALT LAKE—Earlier this year, the Davis School District announced it would be conducting a study to determine whether the French Dual Language Immersion (DLI) program at both Foxboro and Odyssey Elementaries would be consolidated into one school. On Sept. 22, the district sent a letter to parents that a decision had been made to consolidate the program to Foxboro. 

“We’ve had declining enrollment in both schools over the last four years,” Assistant Superintendent Dr. Logan Toone told the school board at a workshop on Nov. 14. “The problem is there are two programs at schools in adjacent neighborhoods. There are 177 kids over the two schools.”

Staffing is particularly challenging because in order to get fluent French teachers often we have to go outside of the country, he said. “That means working on visa development and work authorizations and living arrangements that are coordinated by schools and district leaders. We end up overstaffing those programs.

Each school gets an allocation based on their school enrollment for staffing based on district budget, said Toone. “In order to accommodate the kind of separate school within a school in the DLI school and the non-DLI school we end up overstaffing those programs when the numbers  get small in order to maintain grade level offerings in both schools. Right now we’re about 6-7 overstaffed across both schools which is approximately a half million a year we’re spending that we’re not generating for those kids just based on their general student enrollment.”

Toone said they looked at two options, continue in both and absorb the cost or consolidate either one school or the other. “We started a conversation last year and started a formal study that involved the community. Our goal was to maintain viable non-DLI enrollment at both Foxboro and Odyssey and maintain viable French DLI program offerings in the south end of the community.”

Elementary school director Traci Robbins said the district looked at enrollment over time and projections for the future. “We also looked at transportation over time and burdens on teachers.”

The cost of visas is outrageous, she said. “There’s also retention. Some come to work for a time and then go back. We’re having to go through the process every one to three years.”

Robbins said they took all of the evidence and supported the decision to consolidate. “The families that were the most unhappy were from the odyssey community. They’re the community that would be the most affected.”

Taking the feedback from the community, Toone said they adopted a different model. The following letter was sent out to parents on Nov. 16.

“To minimize disruption to students currently enrolled in French DLI at Odyssey, the Davis School District will engage in a gradual, year-by-year, consolidation effort beginning in the upcoming school year.” See chart

“It’s a costly decision,” said Toone. “But we feel it is worthwhile in terms of the level of disruption and also community feedback, largely from parents at Odyssey in favor of this kind of a model.”