Rock Hill French program won’t be offered for kindergarten in fall

A French language immersion program at Rosewood Elementary will not be offered for kindergarten in the fall because not enough families signed up for it.

Mychal Frost, spokesman for the Rock Hill school district, said children from kindergarten to third grade who are already enrolled in the French program will be able to continue it through fifth grade.

However, “there was not enough interest to continue the program at the kindergarten level,” he said. “The total number of applications was very small.”

Frost said the district needed at least 50 children to create two classes for the school choice program. Children spend half the day learning in French and the other half in English, so two classes are necessary, he said.

He said only 14 families applied to place kindergarten students in French immersion for the fall. “We were considerably short for the goal of 50,” he said.

Chris Gaddis, a Rosewood parent whose 7-year-old first-grade son is in his second year of the French immersion program there, said he wanted to enroll his 5-year-old daughter in the kindergarten program.

Gaddis said he received a phone call last week from a district representative who told him the program would not be offered for kindergarten in the fall.

“They told us basically there wasn’t anything we could do,” he said.

Amber Kamke, another Rosewood parent, is in the same situation. Her 7-year-old daughter is in first-grade French immersion at Rosewood, and she wanted her son to begin the program when he starts kindergarten this fall.

“It’s a wonderful program; I would hate to see it disappear,” Kamke said. “They are fabulous teachers, and it’s a fabulous program. I am so disappointed that my son won’t be able to participate beginning in kindergarten.”

Frost said French immersion for kindergarten is the only Rock Hill school choice program that won’t be offered in the fall due to insufficient enrollment.

More than 600 families signed up to place children in one of the Rock Hill school choice programs during the application period that ended April 29.

Other Rock Hill choice programs include Spanish language immersion, arts immersion, Montessori, school of inquiry and science, technology, engineering, arts and math, or STEAM.

District leaders said more than half of the applicants were for kindergarten students, and the greatest demand was for Spanish language immersion.

They said an electronic lottery drawing would be held if the demand for any of the programs exceeded the number of available seats.

School choice programs are specialized instructional programs due to their focus on a certain type of content or method of instruction; families can choose to attend regardless of their attendance zone.

Kamke and Gaddis both believe many parents were not aware of the enrollment process, despite the district’s effort to do a better job of informing them than they have in the past.

Kamke said she didn’t know about the French immersion program until she enrolled her daughter at Rosewood and was asked by a school representative if she was interested.

“I really believe that, because you have to fill that application out first, not many parents that are enrolling kindergarten children know about the French immersion program, and they are not being told about it,” Kamke said.

Kamke said she wants to keep both her children at Rosewood, and hopes the program could be offered for first grade in the fall of 2017 if enough parents are interested.

Gaddis said he was told he could put his daughter into a lottery drawing to get into the Spanish immersion program, which is being offered at Ebinport and Richmond Drive elementary schools.

If his son continues in French and his daughter begins Spanish immersion, Gaddis said, his two children would be at two different schools.

“I want my children to be in an immersion program because I know the benefit of it,” Gaddis said. “Now the thing we have to discuss is, are we willing to take them to two separate schools so we can have that.”

This story was originally published May 9, 2016 at 4:57 PM with the headline "Rock Hill French program won’t be offered for kindergarten in fall."