Hundreds pack Trinagle School gym
for Dec. 20 presentation of redistricting
By:Krzysztof Scibiorski
Most of the hundreds of parents attending a meeting on the school district’s controversial redistricting plan at the Triangle School last week voiced their opposition to the proposal.
Many parents at the Dec. 20 meeting, which lasted more than four hours, were unhappy with the redistricting committee’s decision to abandon plans to turn Auten Road School into an intermediate school. Instead the committee is recommending leaving each township elementary school K-5, with all sixth-graders being placed in an addition at the Auten Road School.
Other parents at the meeting expressed opposition to the new plan’s boundaries and how that affects particular neighborhoods or schools.
The residents of the Weybridge and Williamsburg Square developments were particularly opposed to the current plan which seeks to move their children from Triangle School to Woodfern elementary school, more than six miles away.
"The current plan negatively affects the value of my property; people will not want to buy my condo if they know that the kids attend a school seven miles away while our neighbors go to a school half a mile away," said Jamestown Common resident Dean Boylan.
Also present was redistricting committee member and Triangle School principal, Charlene Weicksel who attempted to answer specific questions parents had about changes in school assignments.
Some parents questioned the abandonment of the district’s original plan to have one intermediate school.
"Is this a plan for the future, or is this a plan so that the least people yell?" one mother asked.
One of the fathers asked the assembled parents to voice their opinion on the matter by applauding in support of either the original intermediate school plan or the current one. The parents favoring the intermediate school plan appeared to have been in the majority among those assembled.
Several parents asked about the specific logistics of accommodating the entire sixth grade in the Auten Road School’s addition, while maintaining a K-5 program in the school’s main building.
"No matter where they are the students will receive quality programming," said Dr. Gulick.
Auten Road principal Harold Blackstone attempted to assuage the parents’ concerns. "This is a new plan and the details need to be worked out," he said.
After one parent asked that the maps in the original rejected redistricting plan considered by the committee be released, Dr. Gulick balked.
"It will be my recommendation to the committee that we don’t do so. We can’t have a committee made up of the whole township," he said.
At 7 p.m. Jan. 2, there will be an additional public meeting on the matter at the Amsterdam School, after which the 21-member committee will meet to create the final proposal.
The Board of Education will discuss the committee’s final recommendation during its Jan. 14 work meeting and will vote on it Jan. 28.
Board member Neal Hudes, in attendance at the meeting, provided no clue as to his or his colleagues’ opinions on the matter. "I’m here just to listen and consider what the parents have to say," he said. "I’ll make my position clear during the board meeting," he said.
Ms. Weicksel said she was willing to answer questions by phone, and told the concerned parents to call her voicemail at Triangle School at 874-3470.