Schools

Knotty questions still unresolved

The School Board agrees to continue a workshop discussion on school rezoning and magnet schools.

By TOM MARSHALL, Times Staff Writer
Published August 15, 2007

ADVERTISEMENT School Board member Jim Malcolm told his colleagues to make up their minds and called for a final vote. School Board member Jim Malcolm told his colleagues to make up their minds and called for a final vote. Schools chief Wayne Alexander says some programs could go to a new elementary.

BROOKSVILLE - By their own admission, Hernando County School Board members got nowhere Tuesday afternoon on their tangled knot of questions surrounding school rezoning and magnet schools.

Three board members - Dianne Bonfield, John Sweeney and Sandra Nicholson - repeated their willingness to consider moving the magnet program at Challenger K-8 School of Science and Mathematics to another building in the fall of 2008, in order to free up much-needed classroom space for its crowded Spring Hill neighborhood.

Board member Jim Malcolm, a staunch defender of magnets who opposes such a change, told his colleagues to make up their minds.

"Are we zoning Challenger or are we not?" he asked, calling for a final vote soon. "So we can decide this issue for once and for all. It has been dragging on for months and it's not fair for the public at large, for the people who are there."

Lost in the shuffle Tuesday was a question over whether to test kindergartners and first-graders in order to measure their aptitude for the science and math programs at the school.

According to a district analysis, there's no inexpensive and reliable method to do so, and several board members said the proposal didn't sound sensible.

But board members agreed they've lost their footing, or at least a consensus, on the broader question of what magnet schools should be.

Superintendent Wayne Alexander said magnets are known nationally as schools for those who are interested in certain topics, rather than schools for the talented.

And he said it was possible some of Challenger's magnet programs could be preserved at a new elementary school to be opened in Spring Hill in the fall of 2008, if the board decides to move it.

Challenger Principal Sue Stoops urged the board to create more magnet programs like those at her school, rather than fewer.

"We have to be competitive in science and math," Stoops said, citing research on America's lagging performance and magnet school effectiveness. "I totally believe that more magnet schools are better than fewer magnet schools."

Chairman Pat Fagan said he was having second thoughts on a previous board vote to eliminate a sibling preference in magnet admissions beginning in the fall of 2008.

He said if the district promised to extend a preference to siblings of an admitted child, it should "grandfather" in those children to honor the promise.

But Bonfield said that would prolong an unfair policy, giving admission to children who never entered the lottery or submitted portfolios as district policy requires.

"We have an unequal distribution of our wealth in this county," she said, criticizing the previous boards' decision to build new magnet schools instead of alleviating crowding.

The board agreed to continue its discussion at a future workshop. But Malcolm said it shouldn't dawdle.

"We're getting close to where this is an emergency situation," he warned, citing rezoning deadlines and magnet enrollment procedures this fall.

Tom Marshall can be reached at tmarshall@sptimes.com or 352 848-1431

[Last modified August 14, 2007, 21:17:26]