Parents blast planned changes to Pasco school boundaries
Pasco school officials unveiled Wednesday night a new proposal for school boundaries in the district’s west suburbs that would stall drastic changes for a year, but it wasn’t enough to stem parent anger and frustration.
About 75 people showed up at Rosalind Franklin STEM Elementary School for one of two meetings aimed at getting parent response.
The latest proposal, which involves putting grades K-2 in the new Barbara McClintock STEM Elementary and grades 3-6 in Franklin — although at a slower pace than initially planned — would still allow the district to accommodate faster-than-expected growth in west Pasco, district officials said.
Parents blasted the plan and the district’s overall effort at realigning the boundaries, saying that the Pasco School Board and administrators are only concerned with enrollment numbers and not with how such a division of grades would affect kids and families.
“You’re destroying families here,” parent John Hamilton said.
McClintock, planned as an early learning center, is under construction on Road 60 in west Pasco and will open in the fall. It’s one of three new elementary schools paid for by a $46.8 million bond approved by voters two years ago. All three schools have a science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, focus.
The district’s original plan was to keep McGee and Maya Angelou elementary schools as K-6. However, Franklin, currently K-6, would serve third- through sixth-graders while the newly opened McClintock would have kindergarten through second-graders. Whittier and Marie Curie STEM elementary schools on the east side will have a similar arrangement next fall.
The plan also called for carving up west Pasco’s neighborhoods, creating a patchwork of attendance areas. Under the new proposal, the current boundaries would remain and only kindergartners from Franklin, Angelou and McGee would attend McClintock.
Over the coming years, McClintock would also hold onto Franklin’s and McGee’s first- and second-graders, leading to an eventual K-2 and 3-6 split among the schools.
“We have to plan for growth,” said Assistant Superintendent Liz Flynn.
A few parents, all from a neighborhood close to Franklin but assigned to a different school during last year’s alignment, were happy the new boundaries would put them in Franklin’s boundary.
All others, though, criticized both boundary proposals. They questioned the safety of having students as young as kindergarten walk to school without the guidance of older siblings, the strain on families who may already have students at multiple schools and how there may be even less parent participation as a result. One parent said the district wasn’t redrawing boundaries but restructuring schools.
Hamilton said his son, who will be in kindergarten, burst into tears when he was told he might not get to attend because of the changes.
He said the district could have planned better and that the district is making decisions without concern for how those decisions affect relationships and academics.
“This is a problem of administration,” he said.
Several parents said the district dropped the boundary proposal “on a whim,” providing a small window for input before a decision. Many said McClintock should remain as a kindergarten center as originally planned or, more ideally, become a K-6 school. A few pointed out that the district is already making a similar transition for Captain Gray Early Learning Center on the east side of the district.
“The fact they thought the (original proposal) was OK shows they aren’t in touch with Pasco parents,” said Christina Johnson of parent advocate group Pasco Parents for Neighborhood Schools. “They think they know what’s best, but we know what’s best.”
Flynn said comments from Wednesday’s meetings would be considered before a public hearing on the boundaries at 5 p.m. Thursday, which board members may or may not attend. A final board decision on the boundaries is expected at the board meeting on Feb. 24.
This story was originally published February 18, 2015 at 8:46 PM.