Union County School Board proposes new student realignment plan (Raleigh: public schools, square footage)

[Phocion]

Originally Posted by TooLogical

Outstanding list!!!!! Great thinking.

I'll add they need one more step of transparency: a map with each BOE and Alignment Committee (and probably local politicians) members neighborhoods that can be overlayed on the options maps.

I would add they need all the options, not just the most recent. Let us see how the options have changed over the course of the process. It would shock people.

[BubbaHelms]

Originally Posted by Phocion

Bubba,

Is the committee not aligned with the the Board?

The chairs of the committee seem to be close with a lot of the board members. One of the committee chairs is very close with the Board Facilities Chair and the other chair ran a campaign closely tied with the others.

You would think that would have them all in lockstep...

I don't get that impression. If you watch the meetings, it is clear that the committee has no authority. They are merely shown options developed by Cropper and asked to comment and exclude the worst options. They request information and they don't get it. I think there is a widespread misconception about the role of the committee.

[Phocion]

Originally Posted by BubbaHelms

I don't get that impression. If you watch the meetings, it is clear that the committee has no authority. They are merely shown options developed by Cropper and asked to comment and exclude the worst options. They request information and they don't get it. I think there is a widespread misconception about the role of the committee.

So the CAC is air cover for the BOE. Brilliant move on the boards part. They will do what they want and blame the committee for anything that people don’t like.

[BubbaHelms]

Now, the BOE is talking about multiplying the Fire Marshall's occupancy limit by the number of lunches each school runs (determined by principal survey). How is that standardized? The more lunches a school runs because they are already overcrowded, the higher their cafeteria capacity? That's absurd. NCDPI recommends three lunches and allows four when calculating capacity. It doesn't allow for six lunches. So we are going to avoid violating occupancy limits by starting lunch at 10:00 am? In essence, running as many lunches as necessary to avoid occupancy limits.

I give up. They are going to do whatever it takes to achieve their desired outcomes.

And just why is it the BOE is trying to discourage consideration of core capacity and directing Cropper and the Citizen's Advisory Committee to use classroom capacity? It's pretty easy to see when looking at the numbers---WMS.

https://youtu.be/y4SJkxQvtjU?t=35m47s

[Phocion]

Originally Posted by BubbaHelms

And just why is it the BOE is trying to discourage consideration of core capacity and directing Cropper and the Citizen's Advisory Committee to use classroom capacity? It's pretty easy to see when looking at the numbers---WMS.

https://youtu.be/y4SJkxQvtjU?t=35m47s

Bubba - what does Weddington Middle School have to do with it?

[BubbaHelms]

Originally Posted by Phocion

Bubba - what does Weddington Middle School have to do with it?

Core capacity is 637. Classroom capacity is 1216.

[Phocion]

Originally Posted by BubbaHelms

Core capacity is 637. Classroom capacity is 1216.

So this has to do with Wesley Chapel getting into Weddington Cluster?

[BubbaHelms]

Originally Posted by Phocion

So this has to do with Wesley Chapel getting into Weddington Cluster?

I leave you to determine the reason yourself, but I don't think the decision to ignore core was about the mismatch in classroom capacity (922) and the cafeteria capacity (646) at Piedmont Middle School. Though given Piedmont Middle School capacity when limited to core capacity is 646 (215 students per grade), it makes one wonder why UCPS is putting an addition on Piedmont High School to bring classroom capacity to 1712 (428 students per grade). It seems like the addition should be on the middle school not the high school.

[Phocion]

Wouldn't it be great if the news media was as interested this time around??? I don't see a single article in the UC Weekly. Dedrick Russell is no where to be found.

[BubbaHelms]

Originally Posted by Phocion

So this has to do with Wesley Chapel getting into Weddington Cluster?

Frankly, it doesn't matter to me who goes where. If Weddington is the closest school to Wesley Chapel, then why not?

UCPS needs to decide where the students need to attend and then add capacity to allow that to happen rather than allowing the placement of capacity to be a political decision dictated by the composition of the school board.

Relevant data (i.e. cafeteria capacity) can't be ignored across the county because it isn't convenient to consider it for some schools though.

If this realignment is about allowing students to attend the closest school as much as feasibly possible, why was a map never created of what that would look like? Obviously, such a map wouldn't work but it could be tweaked until it worked. It would have also been useful for planning purposes. Then, UCPS would know where it actually needs to add classrooms or expand core. If this had been done prior to the bond, UCPS might have realized they needed to expand the Weddington Middle and Piedmont Middle cafeterias before adding unnecessary capacity in certain other locations.