Arlington County would expand its foreign language program into four more elementary schools next year under the budget that was scheduled to be presented to the county’s school board Thursday night.
Superintendent Robert G. Smith’s proposed $431 million annual budget is $5.2 million — or 1.2 percent — higher than last year’s because the school system expects increased state and federal money and savings from the 2008 fiscal year, officials said.
Smith proposed using more than a quarter of that $5.2 million to add the Foreign Language Elementary School program to four more schools.
Currently, only three of Arlington’s 22 elementary schools are enrolled in the pilot FLES program, which makes Spanish language instruction mandatory from kindergarten through the fifth grade.
Glebe and Patrick Henry elementary schools implemented the program in 2006, and Barcroft Elementary joined in 2007.
Smith said he proposes implementing FLES in all elementary schools by 2013.
“I’m sure there will be discussion among the school board members about whether the implementation of this is too slow or too fast,” Smith said.
The budget also proposes almost $1 million to ensure that each elementary school has a full-time assistant principal to provide coaching support for teachers and more comprehensive school-based testing coordination and data analysis.
That recommendation falls short of a county task force’s recommendation that the school system provide at least three specialists for each school — one for math, one for reading and one for the gifted-student program.
“Different schools have different issues at different times,” Smith said. “Having assistant principals working as specialists, they’ll be able to provide some of those services. I think this is a more flexible response to those needs.”
Smith’s budget also would give a 2 percent cost-of-living adjustment to school employees and would add 21 teaching positions for the fourth and fifth grades to reduce the maximum class size from 27 to 25.
Wish list
Items added to the proposed Arlington County schools budget:
» $2.6 million: Improvements to schools’ heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems
» $1.5 million: Foreign language programs for four additional elementary schools
» $1.2 million: Computer replacements
» $1 million: Full-time assistant principal for every elementary school
