After receiving pleas from kindergarten teachers and special education staff during a public hearing Tuesday night, the Mathews County School Board voted to add three positions to its proposed budget—a fourth kindergarten teacher at Lee-Jackson Elementary School and two teacher assistants—at a cost of slightly over $100,000.

The school board is expected to adopt its amended $14.1 million budget next week at Tuesday’s regular monthly meeting, at which time it will forward the request to county supervisors for their consideration.

During Tuesday’s public hearing, which was held in the Mathews High School media center, elementary school teachers spoke about being overburdened, pulled in many directions and unable to give students the attention they deserve.

“While enrollment in our schools is decreasing, kindergarten classrooms are bursting at the seams,” said Christina Davis, one of Lee-Jackson’s three kindergarten teachers. “We started ...