The Bryant School Board voted late Monday to close Paron Elementary School as part of $3 million in district budget cuts.
The cuts come as the growing Bryant School District searches for funding to build new schools and improve existing facilities. Voters twice rejected millage-rate increases that would have supported the projects.
Paron Elementary will close after summer classes this year, district spokesman Devin Sherrill said. The school's 74 students will be enrolled in Salem Elementary in Benton, which was built to hold 624 students and will be "pretty close to capacity" after the transfer, Sherrill said.
Salem Elementary is more than 21 miles from Paron Elementary.
As part of the cuts, the board also voted to change Bryant High School's classes from a block schedule to seven periods, reduce administrative and school budgets by 10 percent, cut emergency leave for all staff members, and end after-school transportation to the Boys & Girls Club of Bryant for elementary and middle school students.
Additionally, the district will discontinue out-of-state travel and field trips and limit travel of athletic support groups, or boosters.
"What the board asked us to do is just kind of develop a procedure to approve the trips on a case-by-case basis," Sherrill said.
Sherrill said the $3 million is "kind of a drop in the bucket" for a district seeking to build a new elementary school and middle school, as well as construct a cafeteria at Bryant High and update security equipment in its 11 schools.
The district had received $21.4 million in funding from the state's Academic Facilities Partnership Program, $3.1 million of which it used on current projects. It was required to match the rest, but was unable to with the failure of the millage-rate increase.
The district is returning the remaining $18.3 million. It will re-apply for the money for the 2017-2019 academic funding cycle, according to Sherrill.
The district has reported its student population is growing by 300 each year.
Metro on 04/22/2015