Thousands of Wake students could be reassigned. Would your child be changing schools?
Thousands of Wake County students could be on the move in the next two years under a new assignment plan released Tuesday.
Wake County student assignment staff released the first draft of the 2020-21 student enrollment plan, which also includes the areas that could be moved in 2021 to fill the new Willow Spring High School. The release of the new plan is expected to spark two months of lobbying from families before the plan is approved by the school board on Dec. 3.
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The public can view the plan at http://www.wcpss.net/2020enrollmentproposal. People can provide feedback at https://bit.ly/2mJQre6. School officials say they’ll use the feedback to help make changes for a second draft that will be released Nov. 5.
“It’s really important that we have a transparent process that we can inform parents as well as get feedback from families as we move forward in this process,” Wade Martin, assistant superintendent for school choice, planning and assignment, said in an interview Tuesday.
The release of the new plan comes as school leaders are simultaneously working on a new long-term plan to try to reverse the growing student resegregation that has increased the number of high-poverty schools in the district. School officials are looking at using census data to help set targets for making school populations more demographically similar.
But school leaders have said the long-term diversity goal will not impact the assignment plan being approved this year.
The number of students potentially affected by the new plan wasn’t announced by school officials. But last year, the school board approved an assignment plan for the 2019-20 school year that affected up to 5,600 students.
School officials say the majority of the moves are meant to fill South Lakes Elementary School in Fuquay-Varina and Willow Spring High. The rest of the moves, according to student assignment staff, are meant to reduce crowding at some schools, fill some under-enrolled schools and improve transportation efficiency.
South Lakes is opening in the 2020-21 school year, with staff recommending it use a traditional calendar. It would draw students from Fuquay-Varina and Willow Springs elementary schools.
Willow Spring High’s campus is being used this school year and the 2020-21 school year to house Fuquay-Varina High School’s students and staff while their campus is renovated. School officials say they’re doing their assignments now because the school is located close to South Lakes.
The assignment plan has Willow Spring High drawing students from Fuquay-Varina High. As a related change, school officials say they want to relieve crowding at Holly Springs High by moving some of its students to Fuquay-Varina High.
In a change from past practice, student assignment staff are no longer recommending that rising seventh-grade students who are reassigned next year be allowed to “grandfather” at their existing school even if they agree to provide their own transportation. School officials cite crowding at middle schools for the change.
Limited grandfathering is still available at other grades, such as current 5th-grade and 8th-grade students who are reassigned and rising 9th-, 10th- and 11th-graders who are moved to an existing high school.
School board chairman Jim Martin said that Wake’s ability to provide options such as grandfathering and transportation are limited by a lack of resources. He said Wake has to carefully weigh what it can offer families.
“Choice comes at a cost,” Martin said. “Where’s our cost? Where’s our benefit?”
Other parts of the plan include:
▪ Move some Highcroft Drive and White Oak elementary students to Salem Elementary. Students in those same areas who now attend Mills Park Middle would be reassigned to Salem Middle.
School officials say the moves would ease crowding at Highcroft, White Oak and Mills Park while helping to fill both Salem schools. But it would also cause families now at traditional-calendar schools to attend year-round schools.
▪ Move some Brassfield Elementary students to Wakefield Elemetary. It’s meant to reduce crowding at Brassfield while filling Wakefield.
▪ Move some Banks Road Elementary students to Smith Elementary. Students in the same area would be moved from Holly Grove Middle to North Garner Middle.
It’s meant to reduce crowding at Holly Grove while helping to fill Smith and North Garner.
▪ Move some Fuquay-Varina Middle students to North Garner Middle and to West Lake Middle. It’s meant to reduce crowding at Fuquay-Varina.
▪ Move some Leesville Road High students to Millbrook High. It’s meant to ease crowding at Leesville and help fill Millbrook.
▪ Move some Wake Forest High students to Wakefield High.
It’s meant to reduce overcrowding at Wake Forest and help fill Wakefield. School officials also say that the areas proposed already attend Wakefield Middle.
▪ Around 50 students could see changes in their calendar-application schools that could force them to change schools or to stay at their current school but lose transportation. Martin said eliminating transportation for those students could free up buses for things such as expanded service for magnet school students.
This story was originally published October 1, 2019 at 4:03 PM.
