Baldwin’s Baby Grand Gift Could Fall Flat

Alec Baldwin has given a baby grand piano to the Springs School District, but whether the school can use the instrument is part of a larger ensemble of problems the district is facing.

Due to burgeoning enrollment, space is at a premium, and some officials said at a March 24 meeting that the school, which already relies on six outdoor, modular classrooms to make do, simply does not have enough space to give the piano a proper home.

The district has 743 students in kindergarten through eighth grade, according to a presentation in December, and is projecting continued growth next year.

“We’ve really outgrown the space there currently,” John Grant, the board’s vice president, said last Friday. “Initially, we were hoping this would just be a bubble in the population and we would be able to manage, but it seems like the population is here to stay and continues to increase at some grade levels.”

The space concerns in the school have caused some related scheduling issues. Mr. Grant cited the gymnasium as an example.

“Sometimes there’s a whole grade in one gym class because of the scheduling requirements,” he said. “That can be up toward 90 kids in one gym class. One of the thoughts is to have a middle school gym that is large and modern enough for a middle school.” With one gym then reserved for the elementary classes, “that scheduling pressure can be relieved,” Mr. Grant said.

Indeed, Springs is in the process of putting together a facilities committee, consisting of both school representatives and community members, to work with an architect to maximize the space the school district does have, and consider future needs as well. The committee will meet in April and May.

Roger Smith, principal architect with the Patchogue firm BBS, in December recommended building a 16-classroom addition onto the school over the next couple of years to expand the building’s capacity to 950 students. Mr. Smith said it could be paid for through capital reserves combined with a potential bond that the community would have to approve. During the same meeting, Eric Casale, the school principal, predicted that enrollment could reach 900 students by 2019.

The district has “been able to absorb the students under local and state guidelines” for quality education thus far, said the superintendent, John Finello.

“We want to be very prudent in our budget process because we want to ensure that we have all the services to meet our state and federal educational requirements, and at the same time we are abundantly aware of the difficulties that increased budgets put on our local taxpayers,” he said. “That’s why this committee is now being formed. That’s why the board is talking to the architect, to say, what are we going to do in the future?”

Mr. Finello said the Springs community is growing.

“While we’re using the projections, it’s difficult to ensure that they will be accurate. It’s a function of the growth in the community in terms of school-age children,” he said.

Mr. Grant said the district is grateful for Mr. Baldwin’s gift and still hopes to use it in some fashion, for instance in a potential PTA fund-raiser that could benefit the music program.

Because of the space issue, the Springs School Board has not yet voted to officially accept the donation, which was made more than a year ago. Mr. Grant, who has been storing it for the district in a vacant commercial space he owns, told his colleagues that a decision regarding the piano will need to be made soon because a new tenant is set to move into that space.

“The musical director’s room is about the size of the piano, so it wouldn’t fit in there,” Mr. Grant said. “There’s no practical way, unfortunately, for the school to use it.”

A representative for Mr. Baldwin confirmed last Friday that the actor did indeed offer the piano to the school district.

“I had a very nice piano sitting around my New York apartment for many years. Oddly enough, I do not play the piano,” Mr. Baldwin said in a statement to The Star. “So when I moved to another apartment I thought about giving it to someone who could make good use of it. I choose the Springs School because I have many friends whose children are enrolled there so it seemed like a logical choice. Hopefully they will get good use out of it.”

Mr. Grant said the piano is a Yamaha. As of last Monday, Yamaha’s United States website listed only one baby grand piano model available for purchase — at a cost of $23,099 — along with several discontinued models, for which prices were not available.