Miami Herald: Broward School Board to discuss enrollment measure
Dec 1, 2009
The Miami Herald published this article on December 1, 2009
BY PATRICIA MAZZEI
Broward School Board members will meet Monday to discuss asking cities and the county to change the way school enrollment is measured, as the board tries to avoid a looming domino effect of unpopular school attendance boundary moves.
Several western Broward schools are overcrowded, but the state has ruled the district has too many empty seats to justify building new classrooms.
The board wants municipalities to alter how they measure overcrowding to avoid shuffling thousands of students to underenrolled schools in eastern Broward.
A majority of cities, as well as the county, would have to agree to that change, which would loosen measurements so fewer schools would be considered overcrowded.
Overcrowding is currently determined on a school-by-school basis. The district wants to groups schools together in regions and measure overcrowding as a regional average.
The change would not prevent all future boundary moves, Superintendent Jim Notter has said, but it would probably require transferring fewer students.
Amending the district’s agreement with cities and the county — known as an interlocal agreement — typically takes months. The district has a year to pass the changes before it has to consider massive boundary changes.
Some cities have passed resolutions supporting working with the district to amend the agreement. They have been propelled in part by a proposed boundary switch to Pioneer Middle School in Cooper City, which has galvanized parents and elected officials against moving children east to schools in Pembroke Pines and Hollywood.