A majority of elementary teachers at two Mercer Island schools voted against implementing an elementary Spanish language program for the 2016-17 school year.

Superintendent Dr. Gary Plano said a series of three votes held Thursday showed Island Park staff strongly in favor of implementing the program with 62 percent support. West Mercer voted strongly against with only 25 percent support and Lakeridge also voted against with 47 percent support, though Plano noted Lakeridge staff indicated they’d like to reconsider their vote and may vote again at a later time.

Plano said Northwood principal Aimiee Batliner-Gillette polled her core team and drew positive feedback for a Spanish program at the new elementary school. Moving forward, he will explore beginning the program at Island Park and Northwood next year.

“Now that there is interest, I want to seize on that opportunity because I think it’s a really wonderful opportunity for students,” he said during a study session with Mercer Island Education Association members before the Feb. 25 regular school board meeting.

In an email to the Reporter, Education Association president Mike Radow stated there is widespread staff support “in concept” for world language instruction at the elementary level. At the same time, many feel that limited funds would be better spent helping struggling learners or reducing class size rather than adding a new program.

“Teachers that voted ‘no’ in the votes in the elementary schools this morning didn’t do it because they’re against change or against second-language learners,” Radow commented to board members Thursday.

Plano said if the three schools voted “no” to the Spanish program, his response would’ve been to “turn the page and move on” to another initiative. But with the school district having additional funding for the 2016-17 school year coming in from the Legislature to address the McCleary decision, the time is ripe for such a program to be introduced without the district having to make room financially for its implementation.

Plano said for schools to later jump on board and introduce elementary Spanish in the future, new funding would have to become available or the district would have to cut a program to add more teachers.

“It’s very difficult to implement something if you have to reduce something else to implement it,” said school district CFO Dean Mack. “But we do have a one-time opportunity here with a little additional funding to go ahead and fund the program without reducing any other programs.”

During Thursday’s study session with board members, teachers with the Education Association expressed multiple times they were reaching a breaking point regarding workload.

Adding something else to the list of expectations for teachers in a high-performing school district had high school teacher and Education Association member Grant Bower pose the question, “What are we going to give up?”

“With change requires some amount of effort,” he said. “If you are pushing that change, then what would you like me to take off of my plate, that I’m already overbooked, to embrace that change? Because the answer seems to be ‘put it in somewhere where you have your extra time.’ I’m telling you we don’t have extra time.”

At its regular meeting, the school board continued to advocate looking into adopting elementary Spanish throughout the district, with members citing the benefits such a program would provide students.

Board member Dave Myerson, who works as a scientist and physician, commented that teaching science to a kindergartner isn’t as effective as teaching language to a pupil of the same age.

“Language is one of the few academic topics that science has definitively shown is hardwired into the human brain,” Myerson addressed to the board, reading from a letter he sent to the Mercer Island Reporter. “The younger the brain, the easier it is to make sounds and learn grammar. There is no doubt whatsoever that earlier is better.”

Board member Adair Dingle said having elementary Spanish at select schools could be significantly problematic for the district, and she doesn’t want the district to close the door on potentially implementing the Spanish program at each elementary school next year.

“There’s no logical reason to me why we would deny half of our elementary-school-aged kids that opportunity, and it could be significantly limiting for their futures, especially in this age of globalization,” she said.

Plano said Thursday he was weeks away from a firm decision on moving forward with elementary Spanish, and he could provide more information to the board on the disparity of support for the program in the coming weeks.