SchoolMatters Blog

Research on southern feeder pattern schools available for review

At a work session this week, Superintendent Pam Moran will make her recommendation to the Albemarle County School Board regarding the long range plan for three elementary schools in our southern feeder pattern (Yancey, Scottsville, and Red Hill).  At the meeting, she will walk the board and the community through the extensive research she has reviewed to support her recommendation.  That material is available here.

After this work session, the School Board will hold a public hearing next week and then we are anticipating making a final decision next month.

• 9/29 – Public Hearing on the Small Schools held at 7 p.m. in Monticello High School auditorium.
• 10/22 – School Board makes decision regarding Yancey, Red Hill and Scottsville elementary schools.

Below is the text of Dr. Moran's open letter to the community regarding this topic.

Brian Wheeler

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Friday, September 18, 2009

Dear Albemarle County Public Schools Parents and Community Members:

Our children are our future. Parents and community members consistently rank education as the number one priority in Albemarle County. We know the importance of a good education and I know you believe, as I do, that we must make the right choices to prepare our children for the world they will inherit from us. These choices are never easy. Daily you make decisions about resources, time, money, and priorities, keeping the best interest of your children in mind, but balancing what is possible with what is practical. In family decisions, you must consider a child’s individual needs and wants, but work within your family’s budgetary constraints. These are the same decisions facing our community as a whole as we search for the best answer for our small elementary schools in the Southern Feeder Pattern.

Today, I am sharing with you more information regarding Red Hill, Scottsville and Yancey Elementary Schools. During the Board’s September 24, 2009 work session, I will present an analysis of this information and what I believe is the best recommendation to address the needs of our community’s young people, now and into the future. I am making this information public so that you will know what I know, and you will be able to see the scope and complexity of the diverse issues that must be taken into account with a decision of this magnitude; a decision that the School Board will ultimately make after their deliberation. In my final review this week, I am considering several broad categories of information including:

• children’s learning needs and their access to quality educational programs and services,
• costs and appropriateness of facilities in the short and long-term,
• building and construction costs,
• annual operational costs,
• feedback from our school staff, parents and community members,
• environmental impact, and
• the ability to implement my recommendation.

Staff has also reviewed information used by the Southern Feeder Pattern Study Team and Long-range Planning Advisory Committee in their deliberations earlier this year. I directed staff to verify and update this information based on the Division’s current data. New information items include an independent review of small school research, site analyses, as well as data collected in response to issues raised by parents and community members.

I appreciate your involvement in this work and the value you place on our children’s education. I hope you can see from the range of data we are making available that staff has taken great pains to explore all possibilities. Together, we must balance what is possible and what is practical, and incorporate our unique and admirable traditions and histories with our vision for tomorrow, when our children will take our places as leaders and decision-makers.

Sincerely,

Pamela Moran
Superintendent of Schools

Albemarle's enrollment sees biggest jump in a decade

Enrollment in Albemarle County Public Schools has increased by about 200 students over the 2008-09 school year.  This is the biggest increase in the past decade and is much more similar to the enrollment trend we experienced in late 1990s.

At our September 10, 2009 meeting, the Albemarle County School Board received an update on our 2009-2010 enrollment data.  This is preliminary data* based on the 10th day of classes (see chart at right, click to enlarge). 

Monticello High School is almost 70 students over its projection and staff told us that 1/3 of that jump can be attributed to private school and home school student transfers.  That certainly leads me to believe the economic situation is having an impact on parent choices.  A private school administrator confirmed to me last weekend that their high school enrollment had dropped significantly. I also think the reputation and performance of our public schools is making them a school of choice for the community.

Last week's 10-day enrollment: 12,733.5 students as of September 8, 2009
This year's projected enrollment: 12,543 students in 2009-10 [used in budget]
Last year's actual enrollment: 12,531 students in 2008-09

In past posts about enrollment data, [see Dec 2007, Nov 2006, Oct 2006, & Dec 2005 featuring the "cone of probability," and yes we did end up inside the cone at 2009] I have discussed some of the challenges in making long term predictions on student enrollment.  This chart (at right, click to enlarge) is an update on the three most recent 5-year projections compared to actual enrollment.

What will happen as the economy improves?  What will happen with the expansion of jobs at the National Ground Intelligence Center defense facility?  Stay tuned...

Brian Wheeler

*Note: Our budget process uses September 30th enrollment data, so this information is expected to change in the next several weeks.

School Board meeting to tour five elementary schools

The Albemarle County School Board has scheduled a tour of five elementary schools as part of our process to collect information related to the upcoming decision regarding the future of Yancey, Scottsville, and Red Hill Elementary Schools.

The final schedule will be advertised as a public meeting and appropriate accommodations will be made to allow the public and media to participate.  There will be no public business conducted when the School Board is in transit between schools.

Brian Wheeler

TENTATIVE SCHEDULE

Southern Feeder Pattern School Visits

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

8:30 – 9:00 * Breakfast available in the School Board Conference Room
9:00 * Depart County Office Building for Scottsville Elementary School
9:30 – 10:15 * Arrive at Scottsville Elementary and take tour
10:15 * Depart Scottsville Elementary School for Yancey Elementary School
10:30 – 11:15 * Arrive at Yancey Elementary School and take tour
11:15 * Depart Yancey Elementary School for Red Hill
11:15 – 12:30 * Arrive at Red Hill Elementary School and take tour
12:30 * Depart Red Hill Elementary School for Brownsville Elementary School/Lunch on bus as traveling to Brownsville
1:00 – 1:45 * Arrive at Brownsville Elementary School and take tour
1:45 * Depart Brownsville Elementary School for Baker-Butler Elementary School
2:15 – 3:00 * Arrive at Baker-Butler Elementary School and take tour   
3:15 * Depart Baker-Butler Elementary School for County Office Building
3:30 * Arrive at Albemarle County Office Building

Long range planning committee on future of small schools

The Daily Progress has a story today about the recommendation made by the School Board's Long Range Planning Committee to Superintendent Pam Moran regarding the future of Yancey, Scottsville, and Red Hill Elementary Schools.  I have uploaded a copy of their letter to Dr. Moran here.

Brian Wheeler

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Combine 3 small schools, panel says

8/30/09 * Daily Progress [full story]

A committee is calling for three elementary schools in southern Albemarle County to be shut down and replaced with one big school.

Though officials have not decided whether to close the schools, the recommendation is a blow to parents who are fighting to keep the three schools open and believe their children do better in small, community schools.

A copy of the committee’s letter to Superintendent Pamela Moran was obtained by The Daily Progress late last week.

The Long Range Planning Advisory Committee had been charged with making a recommendation to Moran about whether to renovate or consolidate Red Hill, Yancey and Scottsville elementary schools. Moran has asked for additional information and plans to make a recommendation to the School Board on Sept. 24 about what to do with the three schools.

Next steps for decision on three small elementary schools in Albemarle's Southern Feeder Pattern

The media release came out this afternoon regarding the next steps for consideration of the master planning recommendations related to the Southern Feeder Pattern schools.

Brian Wheeler

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(ALBEMARLE COUNTY, Virginia) – At its meeting Thursday, August 27, 2009, the Albemarle County School Board approved a timeline that defines the process that will be used to reach a decision about the three small elementary schools in the Southern Feeder Pattern of Albemarle County.

The Board will ultimately decide whether to renovate Benjamin F. Yancey Elementary, Scottsville Elementary and Red Hill Elementary schools, consolidate all three schools into a new elementary school on county-owned land near Walton Middle School, or another recommendation brought forward by Superintendent Pam Moran.

The three schools are due for extensive maintenance and renovation as part of the Capital Improvements Program (CIP), with funds scheduled for the work to be allocated this fall. The School Board must make its decision regarding the three schools prior to the CIP process so that the correct information and total project costs are considered by the CIP.  Accordingly, the following Decision-Making Timeline for the Southern Feeder Pattern was agreed upon by the School Board:

• Week of 8/31 – Superintendent Pamela Moran makes on-site visits to Yancey, Scottsville and Red Hill elementary schools. Dr. Moran continues to receive and review data on student achievement, discipline, instructional programs, site studies, transportation, state and national benchmarking as she requested of various departments and agencies. A updated web site for this decision will be established.
• Week of 9/7 – Members of the Albemarle County School Board make on-site visits to Yancey, Scottsville, Red Hill, Baker-Butler, and Brownsville elementary schools.
• 9/18 – Data and studies used by Dr. Moran to make her recommendation regarding the Southern Feeder Pattern schools posted to the Electronic School Board system online at http://esb.k12albemarle.org.
• 9/24 – Dr. Moran makes her recommendation regarding the Southern Feeder Pattern schools to the Albemarle County School Board.
• 9/29 – Public Hearing on the Small Schools held at 7 p.m. in Monticello High School auditorium.
• 10/22 – School Board makes decision regarding Yancey, Red Hill and Scottsville elementary schools.

Schools host teleforum meeting on operation of small elementary schools

I moderated our fourth "teleforum" last night with the community.  We have done three of these in the past on budget matters, but this was the first on one specific topic--the operation of small elementary schools. Albemarle County Public Schools is considering whether to close three very small elementary schools (< 200 students) and build one new school near the existing Walton Middle School.  No decision has been made, and this was the next step in soliciting input from the community.  Superintendent Pam Moran will make a recommendation to the School Board this summer.

Our telephone forum vendor, Broadnet, called our list of about 28,000 households (community members, parents, and staff).  At the peak of the call we had about 325 people on the line participating.  This was a smaller participation rate than our budget forums, but school consolidation is a topic that I recognize will only be of interest to a smaller group.

We broke the 90 minute call into four segments related to small schools: background information; achievement; community; and operational matters.

A podcast of the call will be posted later today and you can learn all about the school division's master planning process on our website.  Thanks to everyone that participated!

Brian Wheeler

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5/19/09 * Daily Progress [full story]

Town hall participants tepid on closing 3 county schools

Hundreds of Albemarle County residents took part in a telephone town hall Monday night that weighed the fate of three small elementary schools, with the vast majority of callers opposed to the possibility of the schools’ closure.

“The small schools are very important to our community,” said a caller identifying himself as Michael. “They’re important to our fabric and I think we should keep them.”

Where is Albemarle Growing as of 1st Quarter 2008?

Albemarle County has released the 2008 First Quarter Building Report. Thus I have updated my previous analysis of where new building permits are being issued in the County.  These do NOT reflect all newly approved developments, but rather homes in developments previously approved where a building permit has now been issued.  ALSO, while the County's report includes ALL types of housing, my analysis is limited to single family detached (SFD) homes, as those are a leading indicator of future enrollment growth for Albemarle County Public Schools.

Looking back over the last twelve month period (April 2007-March 2008), SFD building permits were issued as follows in Albemarle's six magisterial districts:

94 (34.2%) in White Hall
62 (22.5%) in Scottsville
55 (20.0%) in Rivanna
37 (13.5%) in Samuel Miller
17 (6.2%) in Rio
10 (3.6%) in Jack Jouett

From my website you can download a historical view of this data by magisterial district (chart above). http://www.wheeleronboard.com/docs/2008Q1-BuildingReport-chart.pdf

For the SFD permits detailed above (last 12 months), the two largest sub-groups geographically were Albemarle's rural areas (65.09% of SFD permits) and the Crozet designated growth area (16.36% of SFD permits). HOWEVER, for building permits of all housing types in the County thus far in 2008 (127 permits in first quarter), 49 are in the rural areas, or 38.6%.  While the percentage in the rural area is a higher number this quarter, historically the total number of permits is low for this quarter and that skews the percentages.

Brian Wheeler

Where do County employees live?

At a recent joint meeting of the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors and School Board, members asked staff to prepare a map showing the home localities of County employees.  We received the map yesterday and I was surprised to see that 66.51% of our employees live in Charlottesville or Albemarle.  I expected more employees to live outside the immediate area. 

That said, the map notes 345 employees did not provide a response, and I wonder if the School Division's data would look differently if mapped by itself.

Brian Wheeler

Update on long range plans & redistricting

The Albemarle County School Board just received an update on long range planning and redistricting issues.  The Crozet and Brownsville Elementary communities should expect a thorough update from the School Division in May 2008 related to Phase II of the redistricting plans to open the addition being built at Brownsville.

Boundary Adjustments - The first phase of adjustments will examine different options for moving students from Crozet Elementary to Brownsville Elementary for the fall of 2009. Staff is currently reviewing 5-year projections, numbers of students at each grade level, current location of students, and predicted growth to develop viable options to be presented to the community in May. After the community presentation. a web-site will be developed to receive input through the summer. Staff will then consider the input, look at September 30th enrollment numbers, and finalize options to be brought forward to the Superintendent and ultimately to the School Board.

Over the next year, staff will toke a comprehensive look at capacity, projected enrollment numbers, and anticipated growth to address capacity issues for the entire Division. Topics of discussion will include the current structure of K-5, 6-8, and 9-12, assumptions regarding feeder patterns, and routing of buses.

Download entire memo as a PDF.

Brian Wheeler

Where is Albemarle Growing as of 4th Quarter 2007?

Albemarle County has released the 2007 Fourth Quarter Building Report and 2007 Year End Building Report. Thus I have updated my previous analysis of where new building permits are being issued in the County.  These do NOT reflect all newly approved developments, but rather homes in developments previously approved where a building permit has now been issued.  ALSO, while the County's report includes ALL types of housing, my analysis is limited to single family detached (SFD) homes, as those are a leading indicator of future enrollment growth for Albemarle County Public Schools.

Looking back over the last twelve month period (January 2007-December 2007), SFD building permits were issued as follows in Albemarle's six magisterial districts:

105 (35.4%) in White Hall
68 (22.9%) in Rivanna
63 (21.2%) in Scottsville
42 (14.1%) in Samuel Miller
10 (3.4%) in Rio
9 (3%) in Jack Jouett

I have been tracking this data for the past four years and this past quarter had the fewest number of building permits (54) issued for single family detached homes in any quarter.

From my website you can download a historical view of this data by magisterial district (chart above). http://www.wheeleronboard.com/docs/2007Q4-BuildingReport-chart.pdf

For the SFD permits detailed above (last 12 months), the two largest sub-groups geographically were Albemarle's rural areas (65.32% of SFD permits) and the Crozet designated growth area (19.19% of SFD permits). HOWEVER, for building permits of all housing types in the County in 2007 (831 permits), 202 are in the rural areas, or 24.3%.

Brian Wheeler