Angry parents seek school assignment transfers

"He'll never set foot in that school"

--Parent Scott Burba whose kindergartner was assigned

to a lower-performing school for first grade.

This from Toni Konz at C-J:

Angry parents questioning

JCPS placement of elementary students

Jefferson County's new student-assignment plan is prompting hundreds of angry parents to ask for transfers because their child is being sent to a different elementary
school than they requested.

A week after notices were sent out for roughly 12,000 incoming kindergartners and first-graders, officials with Jefferson County Public Schools are being assailed with hundreds of calls and transfer requests from parents questioning their assigned schools.

By noon Friday, more than 250 parents had called the district and 600 had filed transfer requests, and officials expect more this week.

Some parents are complaining that their children are being sent across the county when there's a school near their home...

And this from C-J:

School board approves plan on integration

Elementary parents complain

Despite vocal opposition, the Jefferson County Board of Education last night approved the final piece of its new, more diverse school-integration plan, capping a two-year effort to replace a desegregation policy that the U.S. Supreme Court struck down because it relied too heavily on race.

But the approval of middle school and high school boundaries and program changes came as angry parents descended on the meeting to complain about the district's elementary school plan, which was approved last year and is being enacted this fall.

Upset about student assignments for next year, they complained that their children were being sent to more distant or lower-performing schools when better schools were nearby. Some even vowed to leave the school system rather than send their children on long bus rides...