Friday, January 11, 2008
The most recent revision to the Student Assignment Draft was released this week, and next week the Public Hearings will begin for the 2008-09 Assignment Plan. Parents are being given the opportunity to attend these Public Hearings, and if you have anything to say you will have 3 minutes to give feedback and/or suggestions that you would like to see made to this draft. The feedback will be considered by the School Board in making any changes to the current draft, and the final proposal will be voted on by the School Board on February 5. (you may attend all 3 meetings, but may only speak at 1)
The dates of these Public Forums are January 15 at Sanderson High School, January 17 at Green Hope High School, and January 24 at Middle Creek High School. All 3 meetings begin at 7:00 PM and run until 9:00 PM. If you are planning to speak, online registration is recommended although they will be taking on-site signups at the meetings.
While we all await the Appeals Court’s decision regarding Judge Manning’s ruling, there continues to be a great deal of confusion, frustration, speculation, and anxiety regarding which schools our children will attend next year AND what calendar the schools will follow.
Something that has become very apparent to many of us during the past several months is that contrary to what we were told, the main reason that the Mandatory Year Round conversions were forced on 22 schools was NOT to help deal with “capacity” in the School System. Instead, the conversions were actually made in the name of “diversity”. Students were shuffled around the system in an attempt to make F&R percentages more similar, but the plan is severely flawed. Instead of increasing F&R percentages at many of the MYR schools, many students opted-out in order to attend traditional schools, causing overcrowding and even higher F&R percentages at these traditional schools. Many of the MYR schools actually have less students in attendance this year than they did when they followed the traditional calendar.
I feel confident that the majority of Wake County families believe that diversity in schools is a very good thing. Unfortunately, the massive bussing that is going on in our system to play with the F&R percentages has gotten out of hand. Not only is it extremely costly, it is unfair to force children to take extremely long bus rides, passing several schools in the process. I have personally requested data (proof) that this massive busing is helping the kids of Wake County who are being moved around from year to year, but I still haven’t received anything conclusive.
I plan to attend all 3 Public Forums, and I look forward to hearing all of the comments and feedback from parents around the county.
Are you happy with the proposed changes in the Assignment draft? Will you be attending the meetings? What kinds of input will you offer to the School Board? What changes will you ask for?
Posted by on 01/11 at 04:59 PM
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Wednesday, January 02, 2008
The Board of Education will hold public hearings on the 2008 Growth Management Proposal at three high schools this month.
The board will hold public hearings Tuesday, January 15 at Sanderson High; Thursday, January 17 at Green Hope High and Thursday, January 24 at Middle Creek High. Each public hearing will be held from 7-9 p.m.
Persons may register to participate in a public hearing online or by calling the WCPSS Customer Service Center at 850-1600. Online registration ends at midnight the night before the hearing day.
Persons may register at the public hearing site between 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. The board will first hear comments in the order in which people have registered online or by phone prior to those who sign up in the hour before the hearing.
To allow the maximum number of speakers, persons may sign up to speak at only one of the public hearings. Each speaker will be provided three minutes to speak.
The public hearings are part of the ongoing conversation with the community about assigning students to the new schools that will open in 2008-09.
WCPSS Growth and Planning staff talked with school communities near the three new schools: Sycamore Creek Elementary, Mills Park Elementary and Laurel Park Elementary. Community engagement meetings were held at three high schools to gather information for the staff proposal posted online December 7 to January 1 for public comment.
The school system received 1,481 comments about the draft proposal. 1,342 comments were made online, 102 were sent by email and 37 were received on the student assignment hotline.
The comments are being used by WCPSS Growth and Planning staff to refine the online draft proposal for presentation to the board at its meeting January 8.
Posted by on 01/02 at 07:02 PM
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Comments [1]
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
The school board announced Tuesday that they will hold 3 reassignment public hearings on January 15, January 17 and January 24 2008. The times and locations will be released later.
Between now and January 1, you can still make comments on the Draft Reassignment Proposal. This can be done through the WCPSS website or by e-mailing Growth Management. Comments made during the month of December will be taken into account when formulating the “revised plan” which will be given to the school board on January 8, 2008. Public hearings will be held during January, and following the public hearings a final vote on the Reassignment Proposal will take place on February 5, 2008.
Posted by on 12/19 at 02:25 AM
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Comments [3]
Friday, December 07, 2007
The 2008-09 Student Assignment Draft will be released at 5:00 PM today. I can honestly say this is something I’ve been anxiously awaiting for a long time. In case you haven’t seen it yet, just go to http://www.wcpss.net and follow the links. By inputting your address, you’ll receive your “proposed” assignment for the 2008-09 school year.
Remember, this is just a draft plan. Comments can be made via the website or e-mail between now and the end of the year. Chuck Dulaney did mention that if you want to have a “major” change considered you’ll need to get your response in by next Friday December 14.
The timeline for the Student Assignment Plan looks something like this:
-December 2007 - Make comments online regarding the Draft Plan
-Early January 2008 - Staff will make recommendations to the Board of Education as to what they feel the final Assignment Plan should be. (this will be made public and will possibly incorporate changes to the draft based on comments they received after releasing the draft on December 7)
-January 2008 - A series of Public Forums will be held to allow families to voice any concerns or comments on the plan presented to the Board of Education
-February 2008 - Board of Education will vote to adopt the final 2008-09 Assignment Plan
As curious as I have been to see how the draft plan affects my family, I would like to hear what has been happening around the county. How does the draft affect your current situation? What changes will you suggest?
Posted by on 12/07 at 08:58 AM
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Comments [16]
Monday, December 03, 2007
Well, this Friday at 5:00 PM the Draft Assignment Plan will be released on the WCPSS website. The stated reason for waiting until 5:00 PM is so that parents checking the website won’t be competing with schools for network resources. Click here for the WCPSS press release regarding the plan.
http://www.wcpss.net/news/2007_dec3_assign/
As of this point, any decisions regarding school calendar and student assignment are still speculation. A lot of the speakers at the Community Engagement Meetings stressed the importance of “creating” more traditional seats in the system. During the first 3 meetings Chuck Dulaney stressed “All 3 of the new elementary schools will open on a year-round calendar” and also “My department will not recommend converting any of the MYR schools back to a traditional calendar”. However, at the last Community Engagement Meeeting he did mention that “one option being considered is converting some of the MYR schools back to a traditional calendar.” Whether you believe he said that because he is truly considering this option OR you think that he only said it because he knows that the School Board is considering it doesn’t really matter. We’ll all see the draft on Friday and go from there.
Some of the speakers asked for special consideration regarding the assignments of their particular nodes. The whole concept of keeping track of neighborhoods and nodes is mind-boggling to say the least.
It’s no secret that we are one of hundreds of families at Leesville Elementary School hoping to be converted back to a traditional calendar. I know many other families are hoping for the same thing to happen at other schools too. Nothing has been said as to how they will evaluate which schools (if any) to consider in this draft plan.
Regardless of what you are hoping to see, this is just a “draft”, and there are 2 more revisions that will be done before the School Board signs off on the final plan.
No matter how you look at it, I sure don’t envy WCPSS for the task they’re being faced with.
As you think about the draft plan, what are you hoping for? What are you expecting to see? Are you anxious? Excited? Hopeful?
Have a GREAT week!
Posted by on 12/03 at 10:32 AM
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