|
NewsWhat's Up With This Boundary Thing? -Some of you may have been following the discussion with the Boundary Task Force and the recent public forums on the issue. Since it obviously affects all staff and since the newspaper accounts are not perfectly clear about what is going on, I thought I would take a stab at informing you in this manner about where we are and why. The task force has been meeting for several weeks. Upon completion of an initial elementary plan, we conducted a public forum to gather feedback. Based on that feedback, we made some adjustments and also completed work on an initial plan for middle and high schools. Then we conducted a second public forum to get feedback on all three. As you can imagine there is some controversy about all three plans. No one likes to change schools. Having said that, drawing the boundaries is necessary and we are trying to develop a plan that makes sense, that will hold up for a long period of time, and that provides for equity in our schools. Elementary School Boundaries - We last drew elementary boundaries when we opened Victoria Elementary. At that time, we were operating under the assumption we would be doing a referendum by this year (2008) and building our next elementary to open in 2010. If that were still the case, we probably could have made the existing boundaries work until that new school opened. However, housing sales have slowed down and it will now be between 2012 and 2014 before we open a new elementary. Our current boundaries cannot hold for that long. CRE and VES are full and getting fuller. JES and CNS have available space. We have decided we simply have to adjust our boundaries to reflect the new realities and to carry us through till the next school is built. To do that, the proposal moves approximately 300 students out of 3400. The proposed plan is just that, a proposal and the original version has been adjusted a couple of times already based on community feedback. We continue to try and refine it as we go. Middle School Boundaries - As you know, the fall of 2009 will see a change to three middle schools when Pioneer Ridge Middle School opens its doors. Obviously, that requires a change of boundaries. Currently, we use a feeder system that keeps elementary kids together as they move to middle school, so the boundaries of the middle schools coincide with the elementary boundaries. In the interest of keeping that "feeder system" in place and minimizing disruption, our initial recommendation simply selected two schools (Chaska El and Chan El), one from each existing middle school, to move to Pioneer Ridge. The other elementary schools would continue to feed into the same middle school they do today. The reasons for choosing Chan and Chaska elementary schools to go to PRMS was that both of those attendance areas are likely to have stable enrollment over the next few years. PRMS is smaller than the other two middle schools and less able to manage significant fluctuations in enrollment. Having stable feeders going into the smaller school seemed like a good idea. The community feedback meetings have raised the issue of having Chaska Elementary stay where it is for middle school and accommodating kids who might walk to middle school. Those recommending this change asked that we consider having Jonathon Elementary attend Pioneer Ridge instead and we are looking at that issue. We need to analyze the numbers and understand all the implications before we seriously consider such a move. High School - The high school boundary plan is both complicated and simple. It is simple in the sense that it merely follows city boundaries. The attendance boundary for Chaska High School would coincide with the Chaska city limits. All of Chaska would go to Chaska High. All of the other areas in the district would go to Chanhassen High School. This seemingly simple plan is complicated in other ways, however. While it provides nearly perfect balance in overall enrollment between the two schools, it does not provide perfect balance in some of the demographic measures. Ethnicity would be roughly 17% in Chaska and 9% in Chanhassen. Number of LEP students would be about 7% in Chaska and 3% in Chanhassen. Free and reduced lunch numbers would be about 20% for Chaska and 7% for Chanhassen. This deviation has been the subject of much debate. As numbers go, it is statistically small and is actually no greater than the similar deviations found across our elementary schools. Still it is the issue the task force and the respondents from the community have discussed the most. It continues to be central to the high school boundary question. At the high school level, you cannot follow neighborhoods so much as communities and all of the community leaders in our district have expressed some interest in not having their community divided more than necessary. High schools being more of a "flagship" school setting, there is a special desire for Chaska kids to be able to go to Chaska and Chanhassen kids to go to Chanhassen. For the other communities, it is less about which school they attend and more about staying together as a community, to the extent possible. This proposed boundary and the issue of "balance" are still very much a matter of discussion. Wild Card on Middle School Configuration- As if the above issues were not complicated enough, boundary discussion has become even more complex by virtue of the structural issue of feeding three middle schools down into two high schools. The "feeder school" concept at the elementary/middle transition point breaks down at the high school level in the "three/two" situation. If we stay with a 6-8 middle school configuration, which is the assumption used all along, we have two choices. One is to have one middle school feed directly into each high school and "split" the third school. The other is to have all three middle school enrollments split out into both high schools at 9th grade. Both are "doable" but the consensus among those looking most closely at the options has been the "split all three" idea is better for kids. Some advocates say it allows each middle school to create their own identity and to not be trapped under the shadow of a particular high school. Others worry about the management of the split school if there is only one. One school would be a Hawk school; one school would be a Storm school; and, as one coach said, the third school could end up being a "war zone." Still others, including me, believe that having all three middle schools interconnected with both high schools creates the best opportunity for a coherent and effective 6-12 academic program. During the public feedback sessions, some have raised concern about having kids who will eventually be in different high schools "mixed up" in middle school. They prefer "feeders" at the middle level and offer a variety of reasons. It is also they who have raised the issue of a "third option" for grade level configuration, namely having one middle school a "sixth grade center" and the other two middle schools be 7-8 schools that feed directly into the high schools. Advocates raised this with the boundary task force and it is not within the task force's authority. The charge from the board clearly stated they were to develop boundaries for three 6-8 middle schools. Discussion of grade level configuration changes would be a conversation for the school board. Now What? The task force continues its work on lesser issues. The issue of middle school configuration has been referred to the board. They will take up the issue at their work session on April 24. Once the board has reviewed the issue and made their decision, the task force will resume the work of finalizing the boundaries appropriate for either outcome. The task force, as a group, has not taken an official position on the issue, but I think it is fair to say the majority feels the current recommendation (6-8 grade levels with all three schools split between two high schools) is still the best programmatic choice overall. The administration agrees. We will, of course, implement whatever arrangement the board and the community ultimately tell us to implement, but we do not believe a separate sixth grade center is the best option. After a lot of discussion around the developmental stage of kids at 6th grade and our commitment to the tenets of middle school philosophy to maximize kids' success, we continue to see the 6-8 configuration as the best programmatic choice. The policy makers need to have a chance to hear directly from both the community voices who advocate for the sixth grade center and those who prefer the 6-8 arrangement. They need to re-visit their charge to the task force and either reconfirm or change those marching orders. When they do, the task force will resume work on completing a recommendation for all schools at all grade levels. | ||||||||||||||
