Rezoning proposal would shift pupils at five schools
Hundreds of Columbia County pupils might move to a different school next year under a rezoning plan for a new elementary school in Grovetown proposed to the school board in a Tuesday meeting.
The proposed school district rezoning might affect five elementary schools.
The plan would mostly draw pupils enrolled at Grovetown and Euchee Creek elementary schools and place them into a new elementary school, scheduled to open in August 2007, under construction on the campus of Grovetown Middle School.
About 120 pupils from Brookwood Elementary living west of Old Wheeler Road might also get rezoned to the new school.
As part of the rezoning proposal, some pupils currently attending Lewiston and North Harlem elementary schools would be sent to Euchee Creek Elementary.
About 100 pupils currently zoned for Lewiston Elementary, living south of Baker Place Road between Chamblin and Louisville roads, would get sent to Euchee Creek under the rezoning proposal.
About 50 pupils living in the Pumpkin Center area off Appling-Harlem Highway heading west to the Whiteoak Campground would get rezoned for Euchee Creek Elementary from North Harlem Elementary.
Board member Roxanne Whitaker objected to that part of the proposal.
"If you take too many out of that area, you're going to turn North Harlem into an inner-city school," she said.
Whitaker said she expects to receive many complaints from parents in her district, which includes North Harlem, Grovetown and Euchee Creek elementary schools.
"Every time we rezone we're going to hear from parents," countered Associate Superintendent Charles Nagle.
Whitaker and board member Mike Sleeper asked to see test score data and free and reduced lunch figures from the possibly affected schools in the rezoning.
The rezoning would reduce the populations of each affected school and potentially place more than 700 pupils in the new elementary school, Nagle said.
The new 51-classroom school has a capacity of about 800, he said.
Superintendent Tommy Price said he will provide board members with more details about the rezoning at their next board meeting Nov. 28.
At that meeting, the board might set a time to hold public forums on the issue.
In other meeting news, the school board accepted the resignation of a Harlem High School teacher accused of sexual misconduct with a student.
Prior to her arrest Monday by police, Harlem High teacher and softball coach Melissa Chase, 28, resigned after accusations that she had sex with a 16-year-old female student.
Police charged her with sexual assault against a student enrolled in school, Columbia County sheriff's Capt. Steve Morris said.
The mother of the alleged victim instigated an investigation after she found three letters authored by someone with the initials M.C. in her daughter's purse, according to a police report.