|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
News
School board stands by boundaries-for now : News : Oswego Ledger-Sentinel : Hometown Newspaper for Oswego and Montgomery, IllinoisSchool board stands by boundaries-for now
| Parents from Aurora section of district ask for changes
| by Lyle R. Rolfe
| 3/8/2012
|
The usual big crowd was not at the Oswego School District Board's meeting Monday evening-even though the controversial issue of school attendance boundaries was on the board's agenda.
The board voted 5-2 Feb. 27 to adopt new boundaries for the 2012-13 school year as recommended by a superintendent's advisory committee.
That vote came after more than four hours of testimony and board discussion before an estimated 700 people in the Oswego East High School auditorium.
Though the issue of school boundaries was back on the board's agenda Monday evening, only about 40 people were in attendance.
One resident of the Amber Fields Subdivision in Aurora said she was there to express her concern about the recommendation to send students from Amber Fields to Wolf's Crossing Elementary School.
She said comments by board and committee members and others that Amber Fields residents all wanted their children to attend one elementary school (Wolf's Crossing) are not correct.
"Amber Fields North as it is referred to now has never been part of the Amber Fields community. Our neighborhood is geographically divided by a wide expanse of land reserved for the 95th Street expansion and the Commonwealth Edison right-of-way," she said.
She noted that Amber Fields North organizes its own events such as block parties and Easter egg hunts.
"The only thing that ties us to the Amber Fields community is our annual homeowner dues," she said.
She noted that she had not seen anything about the boundary recommendation until Feb. 27 and she had attended all the meetings held on the boundaries.
The possible changes in the special education classes resulting from the boundary change would affect one of her children, she added.
A resident of Four Pointes subdivision, also in Aurora, said they were told that the board was considering moving students from either Amber Fields or Four Pointes to Wolf's Crossing Elementary. She asked that the board reconsider making either of these changes. She said neither of them was in the original committee recommendations.
But if a move is needed, she said moving Amber Fields North would be the most logical solution.
An Aurora resident who said he represented the Homestead Elementary School community said they have not yet been told why their subdivision is being affected. He said no one talked about the Homestead issue at the last board meeting.
He said the board spent a lot of time talking about Churchill Elementary School and the students in the downtown area of Oswego, but not one minute was spent on debate when they sent more than 300 kids to Murphy Junior High.
Another resident of Amber Fields North subdivision said one of the proposed changes is to move the entire kindergarten class from The Wheatlands to Wolf's Crossing.
"I find it interesting that we often look to your youngest, most impressionable children to bear the brunt of some of these decisions. You've got kindergarteners, spending hour-long bus rides in the morning to go somewhere other than their home school. I find that entirely disconcerting when you consider the fact that they're adjusting more than any other students at that building and not used to the rigor of any sort of academics let along a half a day or full day kindergarten program. Yet, a good portion of their day is spent on a bus just to get there," she said.
Board members, Dr. John Petzke, one of the committee meeting facilitators, Superintendent Dr. Dan O'Donnell, and Christine Nelson, director of district student services, discussed what the residents had said along with other possibilities on how to resolve the problems for more than an hour before acting on a recommendation by Petzke.
"My recommendation would be to leave the boundary vote as it was on Feb. 27 and allow the building administrators some flexibility with programs; so, take no action," Petzke said.
The board concurred and moved to the next agenda item.
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
