School Board Postpones Vote on 12th HS Boundaries

The Prince William County School Board decided to postpone the vote on the 12^th high school boundaries until June 4.

Meanwhile the School Board began preliminary discussions on the new boundaries at their May 7 meeting.

Pushing Back the Vote

Brentsville School Board representative Gil Trenum recommended the Board push back the date of the vote, saying “ two public meetings that were back to back, and the updated plan just got released yesterday.”

He added that the “inadvertent publication of the report ahead of schedule may have caused a lack of trust in some people’s perspective” and the extra time could go far a to restore “trust and good will.”

Although Chairman Milt Johns said he thought the changes have been well publicized, he did not have a problem with moving the vote as long as the Board and school division had met all legal requirements.

Since the school division had already contracted to advertise May 21 as the date of the public hearing, that will go unchanged.

Relieving Patriot High School

The new boundaries for the 12^th high school would move 104 students out of Patriot to attend Brentsville. These are students located in the communities of Bristow Village and Bristow Heights near or along Route 28.

Neabsco Board member Lisa Bell said she  had concerns that Patriot, the most crowded high school in the county, would only receive minimal relief with these new boundaries.

Trenum said people from Victory Lakes wanted to provide their input as well. Last week, Trenum told Bristow Beat last week that he was looking into that option.

Battlefield High School Attendance Area

The meeting began with citizens wanting to speak about the 12^th high school boundaries. As the boundaries have been adjusted so they no longer would affect the Battlefield attendance area, many parents thanked the planning office or simply reiterated that to move students out of Battlefield would require them traveling an unsafe distance.

Gainesville School Board representative Alyson Satterwhite thanked Dr. Matthew Cartlidge, Supervisor of Planning for PWCS, for working with Battlefield community members. Even though those residents live within the Brentsville district, she explained that they consider themselves as part of the Haymarket/Battlefield community.

Osbourn Park Attendance Area

Although there are closer schools, parents from the communities of Laurel Hill and The Glen asked that they remain at Osbourn Park, so Cartlidge included that in his new recommendation to the School Board.

Forest Park Attendance Area

In response to comments raised during citizen’s time, Cartlidge explained that some parents from Terrapin Lakes were in disagreement over which school they would rather be zoned for: Forest Park or the 12th high school. This created a conflict since community members wanted to remain together.

The new boundary plan has all of Terrapin Lakes rezoned for the 12^th high school as per the school division’s recommendation.

However, Dr. Michael Otaigbe of the Coles district noted that Forest Park might lose some of its population once neighboring Potomac gets an IT program, which may make room for more students at Forest Park.

Redistricting the County for a Feeder Program

Hearing concerns from parents who see their children being sent to different schools than their neighbors and classmates, Bell asked if the whole county could be redistricted so that feeder schools better aligned with middle and high schools. Parents in the audience applauded.

David Cline, Associate Superintendent of Finance and Support Services, said the problem with creating feeder schools was that boundaries in the county were constantly changing. He said it is something they are trying to achieve within boundary planning, but if growth in the county were ever to stop, they could then do it better on a countywide scale.

Balancing Demographics

Some School Board members questioned the demographics of the 12^th high school. Cartlidge said their objective is to balance demographics in regards to the ESOL, economically disadvantaged and racial minority populations of the new high school. Many parents felt this was not achieved at the 12^th high school, for which minority populations are low. School Board members inquired into this supposed imbalance as well.

Cartlidge said the demographics were both aligned with the county as a whole and the schools that the rezoning would affect. He explained that Benton Middle School was not chosen as the feeder school for the 12^th high school based upon its demographics, but because it feeds into Osbourn Park, which could use relief.

How Zoning Affects Specialty Schools

Lillie Jessie, School Board member from the Occoquan district, asked if it is true that specialty schools continue to accept students from outside their attendance areas even when they are beyond capacity.

Associate Superintendent for High Schools Michael Mulgrew said it is complicated, because in order to ensure the specialty schools continue, enough students need to be enrolled in specialty classes. With higher class sizes, it is even more important to fill those classrooms in order to keep the programs operating. This often means that students are accepted even when a school is at or past recommended capacity.

Mulgrew said the principals have decided upon when to halt enrollment so it will now be done equitably across all schools.