Thursday, Mar. 04, 2010

School board approves new elementary boundaries

Emily Jarrett, Journal Staff

During the March 1 Blue Springs School District’s Board of Education meeting, board members voted unanimously to approve a proposed change to elementary school boundaries located in the southeast portion of the district, effective during the 2010-2011 school year.

The changes will affect Cordill-Mason, William Bryant, Daniel Young and Franklin Smith elementary schools and will specifically relieve overcrowding at William Bryant and Daniel Young.

Currently, Daniel Young Elementary has 469 students, while William Bryant is home to 505 students. The boundary changes will affect approximately 211 students, according to the district.

Assistant superintendent Bill Cowling said discussions about changing the boundaries began as early as January 2009.

“The Citizens Advisory Council made it a goal to remove all mobile units from elementary schools,” Cowling said. “Cordill-Mason was built to handle additional students. We just needed to adjust the boundaries to alleviate overcrowding.”

Cowling said the district held two public meetings for the families that would be affected by the changes to hear their questions and concerns. Overall, he said, the families were supportive of the idea.

“For the most part, they understood the need to change the boundary lines,” Cowling said. “The district also has an in-district transfer process for families who want to go to a specific school. Some parents may be looking at that for the next school year.”

In late 2009, the board of education started looking at different boundary options and settled on the current one due in large part to its use of major Blue Springs roads as the boundary lines.

“That was one of our major goals, to make sure the lines were inline with main roads to make it as easy as possible to understand,” Cowling said. “Also, we looked at the future growth in the southeast portion of the district. There are more than 700 homes that have been approved for that area, and though the economy has slowed that down some, it’s prime for development.

“We wanted to make sure whatever our boundaries were, they would be in effect for a long time. We don’t want to have to make this decision all over again in two or three years.”

Transition activities, such as field trips to the new school and family nights, are planned to help with the process, Cowling added.

“We want these transitions to be as smooth as possible,” he added. “These boundary lines are going to be set for the foreseeable future.”

To reach Journal reporter Emily Jarrett, call 816-282-7018 or e-mail ejarrett@ bluespringsjournal.com.