Parents hear options for Albemarle school redistricting

At least 86 students who currently attend Hollymead Elementary will be moved to Baker-Butler Elementary next year to alleviate overcrowding.

That is the least drastic of three options presented by county schools staff at a public meeting Wednesday night at Hollymead.

The three options are the product of three meetings of a committee convened by the Albemarle County School Board in August to address overcrowding at Hollymead and Stony Point elementaries.

According to county schools spokesman Phil Giaramita, there are currently five trailers at Hollymead to handle more than 70 extra students.

The first option staff presented is the most drastic, moving 134 children from five neighborhoods from Hollymead to Baker-Butler. The second option would move 86 students from four neighborhoods, but would likely be only a short-term solution, acting county schools Chief Operating Officer Josh Davis said.

“This is a good option if we wanted a smaller, immediate redistricting that would solve our immediate issues, but we’re not sure with regard to the next three to five years,” Davis said.

Option C would move 94 students from two neighborhoods in the northernmost reaches of the Hollymead school district.

Hollymead parent Julie Richardson told the redistricting committee that she favors the first option, simply because it means avoiding the possibility of having to redistrict again in the next few years.

“I’m supporting Option A,” she said. “I think a long-term solution is what I’d like to see so that I’m not back here in another year or two.”

Richardson said none of the options would move her child from Hollymead.

Fellow Hollymead parent Chad Moreau agreed, saying he didn’t mind the possibility of his second-grade daughter moving if it meant a long-term fix.

“I thought [the options] were pretty reasonable,” he said. “Option A would move us to Baker-Butler and Option B would leave us here, but B would be a shorter-term solution. We just want to make sure people with 2-year-olds don’t have to do this again in a number of years.”

Adam Burman, who lives in a neighborhood that would switch schools with either Option A or Option C, said he supported Option B because he has a special-needs child.

“One of the things with special education is keeping familiarity, and that established relationship is important,” he said. Burman said he would like there to be a grandfather clause for special-needs children to maintain that level of familiarity. Burman also said that special-education programs are not the same across all school districts.

“One of the things I’ve noticed with regard to special education is it is not all equal,” he said. “I will fight my damnedest to make sure my daughter has the best education possible. If you move my daughter, make sure she has the same special-education opportunities that she does at Hollymead.”

During a presentation on the board’s findings, Davis said making accurate population predictions is not an easy task. Student capacity at Hollymead, he said, is 496 students. This year, there are 570 students at the school. Next year, that number is expected to grow to 581. By the 2016-17 school year, estimates place Hollymead at 625 students.

With numbers projected to grow that much, and Davis’s admission that making accurate projections is hard, Baker-Butler parent Ross Flores said he didn’t think any redistricting option was good enough.

“Clearly, there’s really no good option, because it sounds like the board has no good data about what future enrollments are going to be,” he said. Instead, Flores said, it might be time to start thinking about adding a school or making additions to the current buildings.

“I’d at least like to see that conversation going on,” he said.

There will be another public meeting to discuss redistricting options at Stony Point Elementary at 6:30 tonight at Stony Point.