Rapides School Board VP says he'll offer motion to push back decision on 4 school closures

The vice president of the Rapides Parish School Board said Thursday he'll offer a motion Tuesday to delay a plan that would close four Alexandria schools and rezone students over the next few years.

Bubba McCall said the idea was presented to board members during a recent retreat in groups of three so that the meeting would not be an official meeting under state law. He said he wasn't briefed on all the details of the plan, and his thoughts on it are changing because he realized neither parents nor employees have been given a chance to comment on it.

The "Better Facilities" strategic plan is the last item on the March 7 agenda for the board. It was not included on a copy of the agenda sent to the media before the board's executive committee met on Feb. 27 to set the regular meeting agenda.

Seven of the nine board members are listed as the motion's sponsors, in addition to the district administration. The two board members not listed are District A member Wilton Barrios and District I member Sandra Franklin.

A call to Barrios on Thursday was not answered.

Franklin said Thursday that she had "reservations" about the plan when she heard about it and didn't want to put her name behind it because of that. She said there have been negative effects after the board closed four other Alexandria schools in March 2021 and that she is wary of placing younger students with high school students.

The plan calls for turning Phoenix Magnet Elementary School and Rapides Academy, both currently located on Lincoln Road, into one kindergarten-eighth grade academic and performing arts magnet program and housing that program at Bolton High School.

Bolton would become an academic and performing arts magnet program for ninth through 12th-graders. According to a presentation included with the motion, the school would become the Bolton Academic and Performing Arts Academy.

Other steps in the plan would:

• "Repurpose" Alma Redwine Elementary School for other uses. Students would be rezoned to either Acadian or Martin Park elementary schools. Parents/guardians will be notified about where their child will go to school next year no later than May 1.

• Close Horseshoe Drive Elementary School once District 62 bond improvements have been completed at Martin Park and Cherokee Elementary schools. Horseshoe students would go to either of those schools. The new attendance zones at Martin Park and Cherokee aren't projected to start until the 2025-26 school year.

Word of the plan spread quickly Wednesday night on social media after employees at the school were notified about it that afternoon. Some parents expressed their dismay at what they thought was a plan that had been kept under wraps.

"First and foremost, the fact that this proposal has been kept quiet until less than a week before the vote is abhorrent," wrote Donna Johnson Mathews, a Bolton graduate and mother of a Rapides Academy student, in a public post Thursday morning on Facebook. "RPSB waited until all deadlines had passed for open enrollment, and magnet school applications were closed before springing this decision on us. This action is patently dishonest, deceitful, and disappointing."

Mathews echoed those comments later that day, telling The Town Talk she was concerned with the lack of transparency and that all the schools targeted for closure were in predominately Black neighborhoods.

She said she hasn't been able to get answers to questions she's asked board members and believes the plan would tear students away from schools they've excelled in and loved.

"There’s nothing about this that has been well thought out," she said.

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On the board's website, the agenda item includes two presentations. One is entitled "Better Facilities," a one-page summary. The second, the "Operational Strategic Plan 2023," is a 19-page document that details what is expected at each site.

Staff and leadership at all schools would be shuffled, and positions at all schools "will be eliminated based on need."

Bolton, which eventually would become known as the Bolton Academic and Performing Arts Academy, would have one principal and three 12-month executive assistant principals. Those positions would be require new job descriptions, according to the plan.

Current Bolton students would not be moved and be allowed to graduate from the school, but incoming freshmen for the 2023-24 academic year "would be required to meet academic and/or performing arts requirements."

Eventually, students in the current Bolton attendance zone would be shuffled to either Alexandria Senior or Peabody Magnet high schools.

Bolton students who participate in athletics would do so at their home school.

Both Mathews and McCall also brought up the $100 million bond issue for District 62, which covers schools within Alexandria, that voters approved on April 30, 2022.

The board previously had approved a plan to make improvements to schools within the systems that feed into the three high schools in Alexandria, which they briefed voters on during community meetings.

McCall said people in the neighborhoods with schools with schools slated for closure voted for the bond issue because they were promised upgrades at those schools. He also questioned sending more students to Acadian, which is in his district, because he said it already is overcrowded.

He and other board members have been getting a lot of calls about the plan.

"The people in my district are about to run me wild this morning," he said.

Alma Redwine was to have received new security fencing and gates, renovations to its gymnasium and auditorium and new playgrounds, equipment and signage under the District 62 bond issue. Instead, under the plan, that $2.5 million would be split between Acadian and Martin Park "for any necessary improvements/additions to accommodate additional students," it reads.

Horseshoe Drive was to receive $2 million in improvements, from new playgrounds and equipment to new covered and enclosed walkways to "renovations and updates throughout with additional digital signage," according to District 62 materials handed out by the district before the April 30, 2022, vote.

That money now would be split between Martin Park and Cherokee. The playground equipment would be installed at Bolton "for the new K-12 Academy," reads the plan.

This article originally appeared on Alexandria Town Talk: Member says he'll offer motion to delay Alexandria schools closure plan