Schools

Parents Pick Apart Fulton Schools Redistricting Map Alternatives

The opening of a new high school on Bethany Bend in Milton will be preceded by the biggest redistricting ever in North Fulton.

UPDATED 9:20 a.m.: The Fulton Schools online forum on redistricting for the new high school on Bethany Bend has opened.

Hundreds of parents from across North Fulton got their first look at redistricting proposals for Fulton schools Wednesday night and voiced their likes and dislikes of each alternative.

All high schools in Alpharetta, Milton, Johns Creek and Roswell will have some changes to their attendance zones no matter what plan is chosen, said Yngrid Huff, executive director of Operational Planning for Fulton Schools.

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"This is the largest redistricting for North Fulton high school and middle schools since we started redistricting," Huff said.

Fulton School Board member Katies Reeves said, "Your voices are going to be heard. So if your n'neigbhors aren't hera, please encourage them to participate."

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The second round of the Fulton Schools system's redistricting process was held at one of the schools that will have a different attendance zone when a new high school on Bethany Bend opens in August 2012.

More parents attended this round than the 433 who participated in person last month in the first round. Huff warned parents that what will be proposed at the next round will look different than any of these first maps.

"I can almost guarantee that in round three we will not have one of the alternative maps," Huff said.

What will be proposed at next month's meeting likely will be a hybrid of the alternatives, using input from parents at this meeting and in an online forum going live today.

But the plans don't extend to elementary attendance zones.

"We have not brought forth any elementary boundary changes," she said. "The solution for elementary schools is not to shuffle the students."

A new school would be an answer, but a funding mechanism has to be created before construction could be considered.

Before the parents headed to breakout meetings of smaller groups, Huff reminded them of what the school system will consider in redistricting. Those criteria include geographic proximity, capacity, projected enrollment, traffic, previous rezoning, special programs at schools and school feeder alignment.

"We will not entertain any comments related to socio-economics, nothing to free lunches, ethnicity, race–only the criteria that the board has defined," she said.

"We will come back on April 13, and based on the feedback that we receive, we will present a totally different map," Huff said.

 City Council members from Milton and Roswell joined other parents with students across North Fulton in one of the breakout meetings.

Plan A keeps more of school feeder lines and existing attendance zones intact, these parents agreed, but accomplished little in the main reason for building the new school on Bethany Bend, which was to reduce overcrowding.

"You're going through all this mess for nothing," said Lisa Peverill.

Milton Councilwoman Julie Zahner Bailey said on the first day of school in year three of this plan, Milton and Bethany Bend high schools will be at or over capacity.

"I'm concerned it doesn't leave enough capacity for future growth," she said.

Zahner Bailey said this first map does more favorably keeps a north-south orientation for attendance zones of Milton High and the new high school. That's important in Milton, which doesn't have good east-west access on its roads.

Other participants said this plan was the best at keeping students from having to cross GA 400 to and from school, labeled a major concern by the parents.

Plan B had its problems, with one parent saying it takes all but one neighborhood attending Sweet Apple Elementary and moves them to the Milton High cluster. Don't separate Wexford out of Sweet Apple, she said.

Catherine Johnston said Alpharetta Elementary has a similar problem. All children go to Northwestern Middle School under this plan, but then they are split up with some attending the new high school and others Milton High.

The second plan causes the most disruption to the Roswell cluster as well, with almost every middle and elementary school being affected.

Huff warned parents that children may not attend the closest school, but for Harrington Falls parents, sending children to Bethany Bend when the subdivision is less than a mile from Milton High doesn't make sense.

Ronda Harris was happy to see the three-way split for River Trail Middle School students would be cut to a two-way split. Currently, River Trail Middle feeds into Chattahoochee, Johns Creek and Northview.

Traffic was a big concern for Roswell Councilman Rich Dippolito in Plan C, because it expanded the number of students going across GA 400. He said conversely, the redistricting for Plan B would not be good for Roswell High School at that 400 corridor.

Dippolito said his other big concern was that in any of the scenarios, the number of students going north from Roswell to Milton High School would create a significant traffic problem in Crabapple.

Park Brooke would be redistricted a third time in nine years under Plan C, a parent representing the subdivision said. She said this subdivision should be kept with Park Glen, Park Forrest and Park Bridge.

Ronda Harris and her husband, David, said Plan C also would involve a third redistricting in eight years for Cambridge and Wellington subdivisions.

"The plan splits Sweet Apple Elementary School into two different high schools," another parent said.

What's worse is that it takes the "center" of the elementary attendance zone to go to one cluster, with everything outside that going to another cluster.

Dippolito said the plan splits up a lot of middle schools with students going to different high schools. Another parent agreed, saying the feeder pattern for middle schools was bad.

It was a bad plan for Milton, according to Zahner Bailey, who had tremendous concerns with its east-west orientation.

The third plan increases Crabapple area traffic as well.

For all of its dislikes, parents did like that Plan C accounted for enrollment growth and capacity for all high schools.


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