JACKSON'S OUTLYING SCHOOLS MAY REMAIN

JACKSON -- Last month patrons of Gordonville and Millersville elementary schools cited a safe, comfortable learning environment and long-standing tradition as reasons they wanted their children to remain in attendance at the outlying district schools.

To them, the new, bigger South Elementary School scheduled to open next fall was not a real attraction if attendance there meant the closing of their community school.

At least for the coming year, it appears school administrators have taken their reasoning to heart: A proposal presented to the Jackson Board of Education Tuesday night designated South Elementary as a "town school" populated with children mainly from the Primary Annex and West Lane and Orchard elementary schools.

If the proposal is approved when the board meets Feb. 9, the boundaries of the outlying schools, including North Elementary School, will remain virtually untouched. In addition, Gordonville will remain a first-through-fourth-grade center, while fourth-grade classes at Millersville will be replaced with a kindergarten class.

Primary Annex will house solely kindergartners.

"We tried to accommodate the parents of Gordonville and Millersville, but we also realized we needed to do it with the least amount of disturbance to children based on their residence," said assistant superintendent Fred Jones. "Our first thoughts were educational, but we also included in that transportation and other considerations."

Jones told board members he anticipates some parents won't be happy with the residence-based assignments. The new boundaries and school assignments were made "literally on a road-by-road basis" and didn't take into account any personal considerations for parents like day-care arrangements or work location, he said.

"We anticipate that with defining our school attendance boundaries a little more this year we will probably have more requests from parents regarding the building a child attends elementary school in," Jones told board members. "The building principals will have the authority in giving exemptions.

"The experience of our elementary principals is that once a student starts attending a particular center, that's where they want to go. Our experience has been it's more traumatic for parents than it is for students."

Jones said the opening of South Elementary School will relieve some overcrowding the district has experienced in recent years. The new class distributions will free up some 10 elementary classrooms throughout the district for future enrollment growth, he said.

Dr. Howard Jones, superintendent, said the class distribution will have to be reviewed on an annual basis. The 10 free classrooms will likely be filled within four years if the district continues to grow at the same rate, he said. That growth will have to be evaluated to ensure all facilities are still receiving optimal use.

"We'll be able to absorb a traditional amount of growth with this assignment, but at the rate we're going it won't take long to fill up those classrooms," he said. "It's obvious there are things that occur that dictate changes in our boundaries. We have to recognize that circumstances could change, and this really has to be evaluated on an annual basis."