Potential changes to school zoning ahead
Dec. 27—Over the past year, Huntsville Independent School District (HISD) Design Committee has been working to determine the best plan to present to the HISD Board of Trustees to address potential rezoning of elementary school attendance boundaries.
The primary focus has been to determine what is best for students, and what would be the least disruptive to families.
The committee's work has been the culmination of an effort that began with conversations regarding boundary adjustments before the 2021 bond election. At that point, Huntsville Elementary School was already overcrowded.
"We have since utilized four portable classrooms to accommodate staff and students there," said Director of Communications Shannon Hollis. "Additionally, the overwhelming success of our bond demonstrated that our community believes our children will be more successful with a new Pre-K to Fifth Grade alignment."
HISD is moving Pre-K and 5th grade to elementary campuses for the 2024-25 school year. District officials believe this exacerbates an already overcrowded situation, forcing them to modify boundary lines to even out the population amongst the four elementary schools.
The District Design Committee conducted two workshops with our Board of Trustees over the last two months, and also presented their findings at the regularly scheduled Board of Trustees Meeting in November.
"We want to reshare this information in the accompanying video (see link at itemonline.com) to help make our community aware of the main areas that are under consideration," said Hollis.
The problem the committee had to address included findings that estimated that Huntsville and Stewart Elementary Schools will exceed functional enrollment capacity by next year without attendance boundary adjustments and/or relocation of specialized programs, such as bilingual education, according to HISD Superintendent Dr. Scott Sheppard at the Dec. 19 Board meeting.
"The problem is not a surprise," said Dr. Sheppard. "The Community Long Range Planning Committee expected attendance boundary changes as part of Bond 2021 with the relocation of Pre-K and 5th grade students. We have been talking about this issue since early 2021."
A few things to keep in mind when viewing the proposed zoning maps:
* The maps show potential changes that are still under consideration.
* The district is studying the number of students that live in these areas that would be affected.
* This is a notification that resident elementary students in these areas might change school zones.
* Depending on available space, there is a chance that even if a student is rezoned, there may be an opportunity for that student to finish out their elementary years at their current school.
The main areas under consideration are (see Potential Changes map below):
1. The area on the map along the I-45 corridor and Highway 75 North between the Huntsville Elementary School and Samuel W. Houston Elementary zones, which is currently zoned for Huntsville Elementary, could possibly be rezoned to Samuel W. Houston Elementary to relieve overcrowding at Huntsville Elementary School.
2. The area on the map in the northeast Riverside and Wood Farm Road area that is currently zoned to Huntsville Elementary School could possibly be rezoned to Scott Johnson Elementary to alleviate overcrowding at Huntsville Elementary.
3. The area indicated on the map at the far east end of the district, just south of Highway 190 that is currently zoned to Estella Stewart Elementary, could possibly be rezoned to Scott Johnson Elementary.
4. The southwest area of the map on FM 1375 (behind the Texas Grand Ranch) that is currently zoned to Samuel W. Houston Elementary could possibly be rezoned to Estella Stewart Elementary.
5. The area in town roughly between Montgomery Road and Avenue M and stretching northeast to Bearkat Boulevard and State Highway 19 that is currently zoned to Samuel W. Houston Elementary could potentially be rezoned to either Scott Johnson Elementary or Estella Stewart Elementary.
Staff reiterated that none of these changes are for certain and that they are resharing to keep the community informed of potential changes.
In total, eight boundary maps were created and used to run projections for every combination of models with two or three campuses housing those classes.
Of those scenarios compiled, 12 were presented to the Board in a workshop on Dec. 7. Two plans were selected from those options.
Both plans allow for growth without another boundary adjustment in the near future, according to the HISD demographer.
Hollis said it is likely the Board of Trustees will approve any boundary adjustments in January 2024 to allow planning time for next school year.
The community is encouraged to share any comments regarding these potential changes by emailing communications@huntsville-isd.org.
Contact Brenda Poe at editor@itemonline.com
