Cape schools to hold forum tonight

Moving grades to different buildings and shifting elementary school boundaries are two of the ideas Cape Girardeau School District officials will present to the public at a forum tonight.

Administrators, parents and community leaders have been meeting to prepare ideas for a comprehensive facilities plan that will outline a construction and renovation project with multiple phases. The district is taking the planning process to the public with three meetings during the next two weeks. The first forum will be at 6 p.m. today at the Central Junior High School auditorium, 205 Caruthers Ave.

"We hope to let people know the challenges we face," said school board member Steven Trautwein. "Those being: Do we need to reconfigure our elementary schools? Do we need to build a new sports complex at the high school?"

Grade reconfiguration

When Central High School opened in September 2002, several changes shifted the grades throughout the district. The old high school became Central Junior High, housing seventh- and eighth-graders. Fifth- and sixth-graders moved into Central Middle School from the elementary schools. The L.J. Schultz School, the former seventh-grade attendance center, closed.

School officials are toying with the idea of changing the current configuration to reduce the number of transitions between schools.

Fewer transitions give students more time to adapt to their surroundings and form a connection with their school culture, said Neil Glass, director of administrative services. The current grade configuration compares to 7.6 percent of schools nationwide, he said.

FRED LYNCH ~ flynch@semissourian.com Mark Cook is principal of Jefferson Elementary School in Cape Girardeau.

Glass started working for the district in July, replacing Pat Morgan, who resigned from the position. After meeting with consultants, the school board decided in December to formulate the plan internally.

Forming a plan

Glass has been working with a 60-member steering committee to develop ideas for a facilities plan to present to the public.

"It's exactly the type of information that a consultant would have gathered for us," said Trautwein, who serves on the committee with board president Kyle McDonald. "It's possible that we'll be able to put up a very good plan without consultants."

Jefferson Elementary principal Mark Cook serves on the steering committee, which started meeting in February.

"I think the biggest thing Cape is going to face is the changing population of the district," he said.

He said the new facilities plan will ultimately be about increasing student achievement. Whether redistricting or grade reconfigurations are the solution will be determined as the process continues, he said.

For Jefferson Elementary, he said one of the biggest challenges is mobility. Many students move into the district partway through elementary school. He said those students tend to perform worse than those who stay with the curriculum until fourth grade.

"They know the culture and the teachers," Cook said. "Our teaching strategies have time to take effect."

School boundaries

So far, most of the committee's work has centered around grade distribution, which will affect other aspects of the plan.

"If we have to reconfigure grades, ultimately it will result in elementary school redistricting," Glass said, noting it will be a controversial issue. "People are close to their neighborhood schools and I understand that."

A possible configuration would put pre-kindergarten to fifth grade in elementary school buildings, while combining sixth through eighth in one building, he said.

The district redrew elementary school boundaries in 1999 during the construction of Blanchard Elementary School. When May Greene Elementary and Washington Elementary closed, their student populations shifted to other schools in the district.

Maintaining racial and socioeconomic diversity has been a challenge with past districting plans. Superintendent James Welker said those issues will be part of the public discussions.

"We knew if we were going to do it right, we had to ask the difficult questions," he said.

Space issues

Welker said space issues will arise if fifth-graders move into the elementary schools.

"We have, at the very least, some renovation needs at each of those elementary schools," Welker said nothing Clippard Elementary and Alma Schrader Elementary are at capacity.

Other possibilities include building another elementary school on the other side of Interstate 55, converting Central Middle School into an elementary school and closing Franklin Elementary, he said. Built in 1928, Franklin is the oldest elementary school and would be the most expensive to renovate, Welker said.

He said potential projects for Central High School include the construction of arts and sports complexes.

Welker said he anticipates more forums as the process continues. School officials said they hope to present a no-tax-increase bond issue to voters by next April.

The second public forum will be Thursday at Jefferson Elementary, 520 S. Minnesota Ave., in the cafeteria. Another will be held March 9 at Blanchard Elementary, 1829 N. Sprigg St., in the cafeteria. Both are at 6 p.m.

abusch@semissourian.com

388-3627

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