Final WJCC Redistricting Forum Draws Many Parents

By Amber Lester Friday, March 12, 2010

Two opposing pleas emerged at Williamsburg-James City County School Board’s Thursday redistricting forum: either change the plan to keep some students at the same school or keep the plan the way it is.

The majority of the 47 speakers were concerned about the effects of elementary redistricting on the student populations in Matoaka Elementary School and DJ Montague Elementary School. In the most recent map, available here, several neighborhoods currently attending Matoaka would be redistricted to attend DJ Montague. Some of those neighborhoods attended DJ Montague four years ago until Matoaka was built.

Parents and students from Greensprings Plantation, Springhill and Powhatan Secondary advocated keeping children from those neighborhoods at Matoaka. Greensprings Plantation and Springhill are zoned to attend DJ Montague again, but Powhatan Secondary would remain at Matoaka in the most recent plan. Widespread rumors that Powhatan Secondary could still be moved brought parents out to tell the board to keep their students at Matoaka.

Springhill parents reminded the board the neighborhood has been redistricted four times since it was built. Out of 257 neighborhoods in the division, seven are slotted to move this year that moved in 2006; Springhill is one of those seven. Parents of fourth-grade students said that if moved, their children would attend their third elementary school.

Louis Centolanza, of Springhill, told the board how he was struck by the school spirit in his neighborhood, where Matoaka magnets adorn many of the cars. “I want my kids to love school, to love learning,” he said. “This redistricting makes this impossible.”

Matoaka student Katie Allen compared the students to seeds. “You plant us in the soil and then you dig us up and then you plant us again and then you dig us up and expect us to grow and flourish,” she said, garnering applause from the audience.

Greensprings Plantation residents questioned the logic of sending students to DJ Montague when Matoaka is across the road from the neighborhood. Fifth-grader Rylee Worstell told the board it was hard to change schools in second grade and she didn’t want her younger sister Macy to go through that. “This is a bad idea,” she said. “My sister will spend a lot more time on the bus and have to make new friends. Making friends is hard; most of our friends live in Greensprings West. When I was moved, it made sense because it was across the street.”

Parents whose students attend DJ Montague Elementary voiced their support for the board’s work to fulfill its three criteria: proximity, capacity and diversity. DJ Montague’s free and reduced lunch population increased after the last redistricting; two years ago, the school failed to pass Adequate Yearly Progress standards and the school’s curriculum has been under review. Most of the parents who spoke said they were happy with the current redistricting plan.

In previous redistricting forums, DJ Montague parents asked the board to either adjust the amount of students receiving free and reduced lunch or provide the school with more resources. They echoed those concerns on Thursday.

Leigh Ann Carroll said if the board fixed the problems at DJ Montague, they wouldn’t hear such an outpouring of complaints from neighborhoods that don’t want to return to the school. “Before I left, my children wanted to know if I would ask for them to go to a specific school,” she said. “I said no, I’m going to fight for all the schools.”

Kyra Cook, a Matthew Whaley Elementary parent, commended the board on its work to balance the interests of the entire community. She said the board changed her mind when she had the “good fortune” to attend its  Feb. 10 meeting at the Operations center, where the board spent nearly three hours adjusting the map to meet its criteria. Read more about that meeting here.

“I say ‘good fortune’ because I watched one united board work for the good of the entire division,” she said, adding that she was humbled by their seriousness. “I never expected what I saw.”

The community will have a chance to witness what Cook saw when the board meets on March 25 to tweak the maps again. While the board gives directions to vendor EDULOG over speakerphone, an audience will be able to see the maps change on a projection screen in the boardroom of Building F at the county complex. The meeting will begin at 6 p.m.