A Times Editorial

A cautious choice

As Pinellas County moves toward changing the way it assigns students to its schools, public acceptance remains a key to the success of any plan.

© St. Petersburg Times, published April 30, 2000

As the Pinellas School Board debates a proposal that effectively eliminates existing school zones for future student assignment, chairman Max Gessner has offered some appropriate words of caution.

"I think it's absolutely necessary that we allow existing families to remain at the currently assigned schools, if they choose,"

Gessner said Thursday. "Absent the extended grandfathering, we could end up in a situation like Seattle, where thousands of people left the public school system."

Gessner and his board colleagues seem to recognize the gravity of the choice proposal that was released last week. After nearly three decades of maintaining stable, integrated schools that have consistently rated among the highest academic achievers in Florida, Pinellas is on the verge of changing the way it assigns all its students. As part of an agreement to end the 1971 federal court desegregation order, it is proposing a system of clustered choice assignment that would allow families to choose the schools they want.

But the "extended grandfathering" portion itself speaks to the conflict ahead. Gessner is absolutely right about the value of stability and letting students stay at the schools where they now are assigned. But the board makes a mistake when it sees grandfathering as a balm for all the political wounds that may be opened in the choice debate. Grandfathering only delays the full impact of choice; it doesn't necessarily make the eventual plan any more palatable.

For example, the plan now calls for a proximity zone that is smaller than previous proposals. No more than 35 percent of the "available spaces" at a school would be filled by students who live near the school, and the term "available" is beguiling. At a school such as Palm Harbor University High, which is the county's newest high school and is jealously protected by the people who live around it, the effect would be dramatic. With a reduction in capacity and the continuation of two magnet programs there, Palm Harbor would eventually give proximity preference to roughly 200 students. Right now, 1,200 students attend as part of the neighborhood zone.

Is 35 percent the right balance between neighborhood and choice? The county's choice task force had recommended 50 percent. Rather than explore the number in detail, board members deflect the question by talking about racial ratios or grandfathering, both of which are temporary. What about the future?

In discussing grandfathering, board members also make the mistake of confusing it with a more orderly phased approach to choice. Grandfathering does allow for the impact to be slowly phased in for individual families, but not for the school system. The district would still have to absorb and implement choice all at once, at elementary, middle and high school. It would have to process applications from all 110,000 students, fully staff information centers and potentially operate different sets of busing routes for existing zone students and new choice students.

Over the next few months, school and community groups need to take a close look at the choice plan, and Superintendent Howard Hinesley promises to seek "formal recommendations" from groups throughout Pinellas. The board is not scheduled to vote until Oct. 24, which should allow School Advisory Councils in the fall to analyze choice and critique it.

Unfortunately, as open to public comment as the board appears to be, its members are still wedded to a "single plan" that may unnecessarily limit their options in the fall.

At some point in their consideration of this momentous change, Hinesley and the School Board will need to put aside the legal and political implications and make their own best educational judgment. If they can't agree with NAACP Legal Defense Fund attorney Enrique Escarraz on grandfathering or phasing or on whether different parts of the county should use different assignment strategies, then their settlement agreement provides for dispute resolution. Board members should not want to invite conflict with Escarraz, but neither should they allow his voice to prematurely silence every idea that may emerge.

Gessner is right. Any plan that can't be accepted by the community could have the effect of driving families out of public schools, which would, by definition, be a failure. That's why this choice needs to be a careful one.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.