This from the
Herald-Leader:
The Fayette County Public Schools redistricting committee on
Thursday night rejected a possible scenario for redrawing attendance
boundaries that would have moved more than 7,600 students.
The
scenario, which some committee members thought was too disruptive and
would have brought too many changes — in particular to Cassidy and
Glendover elementary schools — was one of 44 options discussed Thursday.
The committee is working to redraw attendance boundaries in preparation
for the openings of two new elementary schools in fall 2016 and a new
high school in fall 2017.
"I think all of us determined that the
scenarios we walked in with were unworkable for a whole lot of reasons,"
committee chairman Alan Stein said. "They split up too many
neighborhoods and moved too many kids from where they currently are.
"You
might move a whole neighborhood, and that's much less impactful than
moving three different segments of a neighborhood into three different
schools. We don't want to do that."
Stein said it was unclear at
this point how many of the district's more than 41,000 students would be
moved. But the numbers discussed have totaled 5,000 to 7,000. At least
2,800 students will move into the new schools by 2017, he said.
Stein
said a few committee members are "advocating that we hardly do
anything. Just leave it alone ... populate the new schools and be done
with it."
The committee has made no decisions to give to the
school board for approval and won't until mid-March to April 1, Stein
said. District officials hope to have a community meeting about
redistricting, at which families may offer opinions, in late January.
As in past meetings, the committee tried Thursday to reach balanced capacity enrollment at several elementary schools.
Stein
said that at the next meeting, at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at Central Office,
committee members were expected to discuss other guiding principles such
as socioeconomic balance. The committee will have an aggressive
schedule in January and February, meeting twice next week alone.
Among
the discussions Thursday was whether families in the Palomar
neighborhood would be moved from Rosa Parks to Stonewall elementary, but
no decisions was made.
Stein said he thought the committee made a lot of progress Thursday in working with data about students and schools.
"What we have figured out is how to analyze all the data and be more focused on making it all fit together," he said.
Before
Thursday's meeting, Emily Venters Coomes, who lives in the Andover
neighborhood, was concerned that the neighborhood would be split between
Athens-Chilesburg Elementary, often called ACE for short, and a new
elementary school. But at the meeting, Coomes saw a new possible
scenario.
"I was really happy with the map they put together for
our area at the meeting tonight," she said. "It seems like the best of
both worlds. It kept Andover together and it also included in the ACE
district (the) Stuart Hall and Chilesburg" neighborhoods.
"This is the best map I've ever seen," she said.
Stuart
Hall neighbors have been concerned that they are assigned to
Breckinridge Elementary but live closer to Athens-Chilesburg.
"Out
of every meeting I've been to, I think they made more progress
tonight," said Vicky Walters, who lives in the Stuart Hall neighborhood.
"I actually saw some logic being exercised. I saw some movement in a
very positive direction."
Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/2015/01/08/3631536/fayette-schools-redistricting.html?sp=/99/164/142/#storylink=cpy
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