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As Portland Public Schools moves toward a decision on redrawing the map of where kids attend class, the district on Saturday released new documents that point to sweeping changes for the westside.
Nearly 1,000 westside students could be assigned to new elementary and middle schools, if this new approach moves forward.
Superintendent Carole Smith is due to make a formal recommendation to the School Board on changes to school boundaries this month; the committee advising her met on Saturday and reviewed these new possibilities.
Every elementary school on the westside, with the exceptions of Forest Park and Markham, would see changes.
Among the most controversial elements of the possible scenario would be the shifts for a limited number of families between Wilson and Lincoln high schools.
Under draft proposals released in October, students attending Bridlemile Elementary School in Southwest Portland were split up once they left, with some ultimately sent to Wilson while their friends went to Lincoln. In the latest iteration of the plan, all Bridlemile students would go to Lincoln, but PPS would shift the school’s boundaries, peeling off a portion of the neighborhood and sending those children to Hayhurst, which feeds to Wilson.
Skyline School, now a K-8, would become a K-5, and its middle-school students would be sent across the river to George Middle School in St. Johns—a possibility WW reported on last month.
As the committee advising the superintendent has worked to come up with a solution to overcrowding at some schools and lack of resources at others, its public deliberations on sometimes unlikely ideas have created fear and uncertainty about what will come.
The alternative might have been to hold secretive deliberations with the results sprung on the public at the last minute—though the new westside map released at this late stage, after 14 months of committee deliberations, will itself come as a surprise to many.
Many westside families were untouched by the previous shifts, adding to the element of surprise.
The changes—with the exception of Skyline—were spurred by a new official population estimate completed last month that shows overcrowded Chapman Elementary in Northwest Portland will face a larger-than-expected influx of kids. More than 100 kids will be added within five years, according to new projections, where previously enrollment was expected to remain flat.
Parents at that school had warned the district about that problem, but PPS waited till Portland State University’s Population Research Center came through with new official numbers to move forward with a change.
Under the formal proposals from the fall, some efforts were made to address Chapman’s overcrowding, but the new population numbers show that effort was insufficient.
The result is, boundaries are being shifted for nearly every school south of Chapman to accommodate that growth—a larger portion of former Chapman students will attend Ainsworth, for example. Former Ainsworth students will go to Bridlemile and Rieke.
In the past, current students and their siblings weren’t reassigned when boundary changes shifted their homes to new schools. But the extent to which this School Board breaks with the past is another big question hanging over the schools.
As for the eastside, the largest question still lingering is how many K-8s will be converted to elementary and middle schools.
The advisory committee is also weighing whether to make changes that would create more economically diverse middle schools than previously proposed. Under possible maps released in October, there were limited changes to the socioeconomic makeup of schools.
However, the advisory committee suggested it may make exceptions for Faubion, which is being rebuilt in a partnership with Concordia University, as well as Skyline, which is located in a rural part of Northwest, among others.
Willamette Week