To the Editor:

I'm not from Newtown. In fact I grew up over 3,000 miles away in London, England. However, over the last 13 years Newtown has become my home town, due in large part to the school communities that have warmly welcomed our family.

So now, as a member of the Newtown community, I am writing to express my concern about the proposal presented by the Superintendent to the Board of Education to reconfigure our elementary schools as K-3 schools, move 4th grade to the Reed School and to close Hawley School, all for the beginning of the 2016-17 school year.

I believe that if our vision for Newtown is that of a thriving town that attracts new families and businesses now is not the time to close Hawley, or any of our schools. Of particular concern to me is the apparent haste to make this decision and implement the proposal, for the following reasons:

* Low confidence in the projected enrollment numbers. There is no denying that student numbers are decreasing in Newtown and in many neighboring towns. However our town is a unique situation. The only way we will really know the impact of the new Sandy Hook school opening is to wait a couple of years and see. Additionally, we've been wrong before! It's only a few years since we added a large addition at the High School and now we have 1,700 students in a building with a capacity of 2,100.

* Low confidence in the forecast savings. Again we can't deny that the Hawley building needs work. But even if we close Hawley as a school and re-purpose the building that work (HVAC improvements and roof repairs) would still need to be done. We're just moving the cost to a different line in the budget.

* Lack of long-term planning. Apparently the Board of Selectman will consider what to do with the building should the BOE decide to close Hawley. I think we've got that backwards. What will happen to the building should be a key factor in making the decision on whether to close Hawley.

* It is too much change at once. Under the proposal, in 2016-17 the new Sandy Hook School will open, Hawley will close and its students will move to Sandy Hook and Head O' Meadow, and all of the 4th and 5th graders across the district will move up to Reed simultaneously. (For Hawley's 3rd graders it will mean moving to another elementary school and then moving onto Reed just a year later.) Let the Sandy Hook School community get settled in their new home before making more changes.

I urge the Board of Education not to rush into this decision and to think long and hard about the impact of closing a school on all of our children and our community.

Jillian Cruwys

24 Georges Hill Road, Newtown     June 10, 2015