Abilene ISD rolls out its plan for grade reconfiguration; seeks input

The Abilene ISD has rolled out a plan to change grade configurations beginning with the 2024-25 school year, going from three levels to four.

The plan would be separate fifth-graders from the elementary level and sixth-graders from the middle-school level. The new configuration would be: kindergarten to fourth; fifth and sixth; seventh and eighth; and the final four grades still in high school.

The 5th-6th level would be called "intermediate."

Superintendent David Young said the new level would serve as a bridge for students of that age to the secondary level. The district asked, "How are helping kids to develop academically, socially, mentally?"

Young believes "families will appreciate that."

The district would reduce its elementary campuses from 13 to 10 and middle school campuses from four to three.

The district has been in its current format for close to 40 years, Superintendent David Young said at brief media event Thursday morning at One AISD Center. This would not be a test.

"We know that this is not a short-term decision," he said.

Reconfiguration implementation would skip a school year because, Young said, it would take a school year to prepare for a change, such as transportation and supply needs.

Public input is sought with the first meeting scheduled from 5:30-6:30 p.m. Thursday at Clack Middle School, 16010 Corsicana Ave. Clack would become a 5th-6th grade campus in AISD's plan, which would cut current middle schools from four to three.

Additional town hall meetings are planned from 9-10 a.m. Tuesday at Madison, 5:30-6:30 p.m. Feb 20 at Craig Middle School and the same time Feb. 21 at Mann Middle School.

Surveys also will be conducted.

Young said the plan was been discussed for months by the school board,

Three elementary campuses also would become intermediate campuses, he said.

Those would be Bowie, Martinez and Purcell elementaries.

"It makes the most sense to use, from a geographic and capacity standpoint," Young said. The biggest capacity opportunity currently for the district is at its middle schools.

Mann would remain an Abilene High feeder campus and Madison the feeder campus for Cooper High School. Students attending Clack would go to either high school after eighth grade.

"There are lots of districts across the state that have split middle schools," he said. "While we will have to make some adjustments, we don't feel that is a barrier we can't overcome."

High schools themselves would be unaffected. Early learning campuses would remain the same.

"That would make me the former superintendent of the Abilene ISD very quickly," Young said, joking about making high school changes.

Young said the plan would not call for construction of more campuses. There is space available in the district, he said.

"We have the capacity to do this now in our existing facilities," he said. "There are some logistically challenging pieces to this. I do think our parents see the greater good of a better developmental model, a better academic model to support their kids. That's some really fragile times in their lives.

"They are not going to have to drive all the way across town now or anything like that but they might have kids are more campuses in their family that they have to deal with.

"We're sensitive to that. We just feel like the overwhelming benefits academically, socially, mentally hopefully in their minds will outweigh those challenges."

He said, though, that this plan potentially could attract more students, either having families choose to move to Abilene or stay in the city. The AISD has been experiencing total enrollment decline, and now sits just above 15,000 students.

"We think it will keep families in Abilene ISD and it will attract new ones to Abilene ISD," he said. "Any time you have growth, you need to meet the needs of that growth."

But for now, it's too early to make predictions on how the change will affect the district's student population.

Young said another consideration in creating a new level was the jump from neighborhood elementary schools to much larger campuses. He believes the current 6th-7th-8th format is hard on students of that age.

The school board could vote on making the configuration change in late spring. Feedback will be presented to them in March, Young said Thursday.

Information on the proposed change and maps of attendance zones can be found on the district's website, abileneisd.org.

How it's configured in the WISD

Here is how the Wylie ISD is set:

EAST SIDE

• Elementary: Kindergarten-3rd grade

• Intermediate: Grades 4-5

• Junior High: Grades 6-8 (Sixth-grade classrooms are grouped separately)

WEST SIDE

• Early Childhood: Pre-K and kindergarten

• Elementary: Grades 1-2

• Intermediate: Grades 3-4

• Junior High: Grades 5-8 (Grades 5-6 are in one building and grades 7-8 in an adjoining building)

• High School: Grades 9-12

Superintendent Joey Light said these groupings largely are based on building space. He said keeping fifth- and sixth-graders together is a good strategy. They do not mix with seventh- and eighth-graders, though grouped as junior high.

This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Abilene ISD rolls out its plan for grade reconfiguration; seeks input