CONTINUING COVERAGE: The Journal-News was the only media outlet to report on the Fairfield school board's meeting and vote to make sweeping changes in the school district's attendance zones.
Fairfield’s school board made historically sweeping changes to its school attendance zones in a unanimous vote after no public objections Thursday evening.
The new zones — brought on largely by three new schools being built in the Butler County school district — will impact almost all of the district's 9,000 students, but not until the start of the 2017-2018 school year.
The redistricting of attendance zones will change school building enrollment for elementary students as they graduate to middle school.
Students attending West, South and Central elementary schools will feed into Creekside Middle School on Nilles Road — the existing middle school — and those attending North, East and the soon-to-be-built Compass elementary schools will feed into the Crossroads Middle School on Donald Drive — the existing intermediate school.
On June 29, Paul Otten, the district’s exiting superintendent, recommended the proposal. New Superintendent Billy Smith also supports the recommendation and was backed by Fairfield’s governing board.
“It’s a very exciting and historic time in Fairfield,” Smith said after the board vote.
Smith thanked school residents for supporting the 2014 school tax levy that is paying for construction of the three schools — along with millions from a state school construction fund — which prompted the re-drawing of attendance lines in anticipation of their opening by the start of the 2017-2018 school year.
School parent Shannon Chaffee was the only school parent to speak to the board, sharing her concerns the redistricting would force her elementary student to switch schools two consecutive years starting in 2018.
“I understand the changes, and I’m sure it’s a hard decision (for the board) because no matter what they choose, somebody is going to be affected,” said Chaffee.
School parent Patti Wells said, “I’m not really concerned about it because I feel the district is doing the best they can to figure out the best situation for all the students.”
Wells described the three new schools, which are now under construction, as a “gift to the district.”
“I feel like I trust they are doing the best they can in dividing us (attendance zones) up,” she said.
The proposed reconfiguration would limit building transitions students would have to experience, said Smith. Currently, a student’s path from elementary to high school includes stops at the intermediate, middle and freshman schools.
The new attendance plan would eliminate one of those transitions, and reduce the crowded population at the middle school.
Smith added the transition from the freshman to high school would be more like a half-transition since the new freshman building will be located just across Holden Boulevard from the high school.
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