Having decided to abandon the idea of creating a 6th Grade academy at Kings Bridge Middle School in a bid to relieve overcrowding at West Jackson Middle School, Jackson County School System leaders are now planning to present a totally new proposal Monday night that includes consolidating some school facilities on the East side.
Among the ideas that are expected to be presented Monday night is a plan to move South Jackson Elementary School into the newer Kings Bridge Middle School facility; consolidating KBMS 6th and 7th Graders into East Jackson Middle School; adding 8th Graders to East Jackson Comprehensive High School; and building a new wing onto West Jackson Intermediate School. School leaders say the consolidation moves would save around $500,000- $1 million next year.
The Jackson County Board of Education will meet for its regular session at 6 p.m. followed by a community meeting at 7 p.m.
FOCUS SHIFTED
School leaders have been focused in recent weeks on exploring ways to relieve overcrowding in facilities on the West side of the county which has seen much more growth than the East side. According to data presented last week, the West side will reach its capacity of classrooms next year while the East side won’t reach capacity until 2026.
But the focus of those efforts has now shifted somewhat after new financial data was presented at the BOE’s Thursday night meeting. An amended budget for the current year shows that despite some cost cutting through attrition, the system faces using up a significant part of its reserves by the end of the current fiscal year. The amended budget shows that the system will use up $4 million out of its $6 million in reserves by June 30.
By mothballing SJES and making more use of newer facilities, system leaders believe a lot of money could be saved next year. A new wing on WJIS would give the system additional classrooms on that side of the county to help relive overcrowding.
BOE to hear new plan Monday night for facilities; some East side consolidation to be discussed
THURSDAY
Last Thursday, the BOE held a community meeting at KBMS at which superintendent John Green announced the system would not pursue the 6th Grade plan.
Green and other school leaders gave a brief slide presentation to the crowd of mostly West Jackson parents about the dilemma the system faces in trying to plan for growth. The system now has an enrollment of 7,535 students and overall capacity for 8,340.
But that capacity is skewed toward having more classrooms on the slow-growing East side and not enough classrooms on the faster-growing West side. The East side of the county has a capacity of 4,375 with an enrollment of 3,620. Projections indicate growth on the East side won’t fill that capacity until 2026.
On the other hand, the fast-growing West side has a capacity of just 3,965 with enrollment of 3,915 and will exceed its capacity next year.
One of the problems with this imbalance, Green told the crowd, is that the system has to fill 100 percent of all its classrooms before it can qualify for any of its earned state building funds, which at this point is $12 million. Without those funds, the system will have to pay for facility additions out of local funds.
A dozen or so members of the crowd asked questions or made comments at the meeting. Although mostly cordial, many of those who spoke said they didn’t support having students on the West side moved to an East side school because of the distance and cost of gas. Several parents of KBMS students said they didn’t want that school disrupted and those students moved to another school in the area.
One woman in the crowd shouted to Green that he was “trying to cram this down our throats.” Green responded by saying that the system had been very open in its discussions about its facilities problem and had been actively soliciting community input.
“We’re not cramming anything down your throat,” he said.
Last Thursday, the BOE held a community meeting at KBMS at which superintendent John Green announced the system would not pursue the 6th Grade plan.
Green and other school leaders gave a brief slide presentation to the crowd of mostly West Jackson parents about the dilemma the system faces in trying to plan for growth. The system now has an enrollment of 7,535 students and overall capacity for 8,340.
But that capacity is skewed toward having more classrooms on the slow-growing East side and not enough classrooms on the faster-growing West side. The East side of the county has a capacity of 4,375 with an enrollment of 3,620. Projections indicate growth on the East side won’t fill that capacity until 2026.
On the other hand, the fast-growing West side has a capacity of just 3,965 with enrollment of 3,915 and will exceed its capacity next year.
One of the problems with this imbalance, Green told the crowd, is that the system has to fill 100 percent of all its classrooms before it can qualify for any of its earned state building funds, which at this point is $12 million. Without those funds, the system will have to pay for facility additions out of local funds.
A dozen or so members of the crowd asked questions or made comments at the meeting. Although mostly cordial, many of those who spoke said they didn’t support having students on the West side moved to an East side school because of the distance and cost of gas. Several parents of KBMS students said they didn’t want that school disrupted and those students moved to another school in the area.
One woman in the crowd shouted to Green that he was “trying to cram this down our throats.” Green responded by saying that the system had been very open in its discussions about its facilities problem and had been actively soliciting community input.
“We’re not cramming anything down your throat,” he said.
WJMS AND WJIS ARE TWO TOTALLY DIFFERENT FACILITIES!!!!!
GET YOUR SPELL CHECKER AND FACT CHECKER TO CHECK BEHIND YOU MIKE!!!!
Will it really pan out? Will we really gain $12,000,000? Or will will waste more than that? Not to mention why are you not asking out why we would hire un qualified personnel for jobs in the system, yet now they are about to get rid of many positions, through what they will call "attrition" ?
All the while no one has even addressed how any of this is affecting and will affect all the children you will be uprooting and moving.
Even after the question was asked (3 times) at the meeting last night how adding a wing to the Intermediate school would relieve the overcrowding in the Middle School in WJ, I am not convinced the question was ever answered. Can anyone explain the answer that question?
Will this $12million capital outlay money expire at some time in the future? I wasn't convinced of why there was such an urgency or "emergency" to make a decision to make such significant changes without any further meetings with the community to discuss the options.
How sure are the members of the BOE that there will be 3% continued growth? Are you certain that the west side wouldn't end up with unfilled classrooms as well several years from now?
And while the question was asked several times as to why not consider redistricting instead, I don't believe the question was ever answered, either. By looking at the map, I can guess that simply redistricting might not likely yeild the student redistribution that would be needed, since it does appear that the population in west jackson is very condensed in a small geographical area, so if redistricting were to take place, it would take the majority of what is current districted for west jackson schools to adequately adjust the student population. It could likely result in one or two subdivisions being all that was districted for the west jackson elementary and middle schools.
It seems to me that Jackson County schools are in a real pickle over this issue, there are no readily obvious good solutions, with Jefferson City schools sitting right smack in the middle, and the entire county so spread out with the bulk of the population living in a very small percentage of the overall county.
In other school districts where redistricting is a regularly occurring event, the parents were able to tolerate it when they were offered the option to keep their child in their current school and assume responsibility for transportation, or send their child to the newly districted school and utilize the transportation provided by the school.
A second idea is that when a school offers a program that students and parents really want to be a part of, they will gladly drive great distances to attend the school of their choice. In other words, give the parents and the students a reason to WANT to travel great distances to attend the schools that need population adjusting. Augusta/Richmond County figured it out years ago by putting their magnet school programs & technical programs in the schools where students needed to be added.
We are all FOR Jackson County.
We all hate change.
Something has to be done to correct the problem of overcrowding in our schools.
It doesn't help to attack the school board or the administration or even the editor of the local newspaper.
What will help is concerned, level-headed citizens working together with the school board and the administration to solve the problem. Crowding is a problem, but it has to be fixed WITHIN the budget constraints.
Change will be needed. Some will have to make sacrifices. Let's just pull together as parents of Jackson County students and get the job done.
In other words, its ok for the newspaper to attack at will, its ok for the "leaders" to do their will, but let someone question, ask, inquire, then they are labeled as a naysayer.
The people of this county really do care about the county, but we are now being led by ones who need to re-think what the motives they are seeking will do to the students of jackson county and those that teach them every day.
force their ideas on the public. They put 'spin
' on the news to suit their own agenda. An editoral in fact IS the writers opinion. But REPORTING the news is different entirely.
You should check with employees of the school district who have TRIED talking with Bd. members to express their concerns. Unfortunately, the Bd. refuses to admit the MANY shortcomings of the superintendent, which includes, but is not limited to, his unprofessional behavior behind closed doors. All concerns are written off as "rumors" even though time and time again, the same concerns are brought forth by different employees from different schools. The Bd. members REFUSE to listen to or believe what employees are continuously telling them; yet, they continue to go right along with whatever the superintendent wants and they believe whatever HE says. Isn't there something wrong with this picture?
And, yes.....there are frustrations from parents and citizens because every time one turns around, something else is being done or proposed or changed or unqualified people are being hired, etc.... You can just imagine the frustration of employees who have had NO input on decisions being made even though these decisions affect them. The employees have no voice.
There have been decisions made that the public isn't even aware of, yet some decisions will affect a lot of parents who have current students. One example - the driver's ed program will no longer exist after this year. Did the employees get a voice in this decision? Of course not, but I'm sure parents would have appreciated being included in an open discussion about this decision.
Parents and concerned citizens are the ONLY people who have made a difference regarding recent proposals. Taking time to show up in numbers at these "community meetings" and speaking out - their actions and involvement are to be praised!!
A BIG THANK YOU goes out to all those parents and citizens for making their voices heard!! Keep up the good work!!
If this move occurs, my child will be riding the bus for 20 miles each way to school.
And most KBMS parents are very happy with ou school.
The whole situation is so unfair, I am seriously considering moving my child to another school district whose "leaders" are not so grossly inept.
Second, I understand concerns of 8th graders at the high school. So, leave 6th graders at the new SJES??? Put 7th and 8th at EJMS...... thats the 2 grades that are allowed to play sports, etc.... and possibly keep parents happy? Never going to please everyone and no most do not like change. But somehow, someway - it does seem to workout. Parents are a valuable tool in a childs life and stay involved with them - NO MATTER WHAT SCHOOL THEY ARE IT! Yes, folks - there are tons of problems at private schools too. Just ask around!
And guess what? The Bd. will be going right along with him on the South Jackson Elementary closing even though we plainly said NO to this proposal. I thought we elected the Bd. to look out for US and our children -- not snug up to a superintendent who is tearing the school district apart while he also stomps on employee morale. The Bd. won't listen to employees - they only listen to and go along with Green. I thought the Bd. is supposed to be HIS superior, but it looks like he tells THEM what to do.
And now, who cares what we, the parents and community members, say, right? The vote could be 100 to 1 against, but I guarantee you he will find a way to push this through and as usual, the Bd. will give him what he wants.
And yes, there are ALWAYS "secret" meetings behind closed doors so no one knows what's going on until the superintendent gets his way and the deal is done. It is only AFTER these little meetings that we find out SOME of the information. Does that sound right to anyone?
What is it going to take to make someone listen to US instead of lying to us? Can you spell "recall"? WE, the community and parents, need to push forward with this fight - DO NOT give up!
Maybe the State Dept. of Education needs some phone calls. Maybe the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools needs some phone calls too!
And hearing the joke of a high school principal speak on Monday, my kids were just embarrassed to hear him speak. Was he drinking? His skills to speak with knowledge and fluency were lacking..... I have kids currently at EJCHS and says he's cocky, weird and talks to them, not as an administrator but, as a buddy! Friendly is awesome - I want mine to feel like they can communicate with the principal, if need be, but he is odd. Has said some inappropriate things to students. Thats another petition that needs to be started - get him out of EJCHS NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And, I was told that Dr Greene, April Howard and Kathy Elrod did that fantastic hiring job. The board did not have a say in this catastrophe!