Lehighton Area School District board members expressed sticker shock Monday night over a proposed $44,000 professional development contract with the University of Delaware, questioning whether the steep price tag is justified for continued training on the district’s one-year-old reading curriculum.

The discussion centered on a professional development program for the Bookworms reading series, which the district adopted last year at a cost of just over $250,000.

The University of Delaware, which sponsors and authored the Bookworm series, would provide ongoing training for teachers implementing the curriculum.

Superintendent Jason Moser noted that the district has teachers transferring into positions where they will use the series, as well as new hires and potentially first-year teachers who need training. However, he expressed openness to alternatives.

“Is there room to scale that back some and lean on some of our teachers who have already become somewhat expert at implementation?” Moser said.

Moser emphasized the importance of not making hasty decisions about professional development after curriculum adoption.

“What we don’t want to do is completely pull the carpet out of the same type of professional development being received for implementing a curricular series, after one year and drastically change course,” he said. “There is always going to be an implementation dip in year one. Whenever you go with something new, that’s to be expected to some degree. So that’s why that second year follow up is often included with a lot of products.”

However, board members remained skeptical about the cost.

“What are we paying our teachers for if we’re going to spend $44,000 to have something done for them,” director Duane Dellecker said. “I’m just dumbfounded. So we’re hiring basically consultants to be coaches for our teachers to tell them what they’re doing well and what they’re doing bad. What are our administrators for?”

Gretchen Laviolette, the district’s director of instructional technology and curriculum, defended the program’s structure, explaining that it differs from typical professional development.

“What makes this just a little bit different than a lot of the other professional development that we get is we have a total of eight days they will come in and observe our teachers in action,” she said.

Laviolette emphasized that the training occurs during regular school days, not professional development days, with “three different representatives from University of Delaware who come in and observe our teachers, and then they return the next day to dialog with the teachers about what they observed and what improvements the teachers could make.”

She acknowledged the administrators are also learning the new approach. “Administrators are just as new to the Bookworms series as the teachers are,” Laviolette added. “It is a very different approach to teaching reading than what has been used with past series. It’s more known as the science of reading.”

Moser noted that the professional development would also train administrators.

Board members indicated they want to hear directly from teachers before making a decision.

“I’d just like to hear what the teachers have to say,” director Barbara Bowes said. “I just think if we’re going to spend a ton of money, we have to make sure it’s going to be valuable to the staff and to the kids.”

Moser said the district would conduct further analysis, including reviewing test scores and gathering teacher feedback before the voting meeting.

“We should not just accept blindly that this professional development was worth this level of money,” he said.