Battle Over Broward School Boundaries
Parents, Students Say Portable Classrooms, Not Boundary Changes, Are The Answer To Overcrowding
POSTED: Friday, November 20, 2009
UPDATED: 5:18 am EST November 20,2009
HOLLYWOOD, Fla. -- Hundreds of parents and students, wearing red t-shirts, gathered in the auditorium of McArthur High School in Hollywood Thursday night for the second of four meeting to discuss proposed school boundary changes. There was such a big turnout, dozens had to sit in the overflow room at the school's gym.
"You want your children walking with their friends and riding bikes with their friends and staying with their friends. And, if that happens, I don't forsee it being a good thing," Alisha Ruma told Local 10's Janine Stanwood.
Students at the meeting didn't see the propsed changes as a good thing either.
"I don't want boundary changes," said one Pioneer student.
But Pioneer's enrollment, according to the Broward School District, is ballooning.
So the district is proposing moving some students out of Pioneer, in Cooper City, to three other schools.
For many Pioneer students who walk or ride bicycles, the changes would mean taking a bus.
The district has two plans. One involves moving 173 students to Pines Middle School in Pembroke Pines. Some of those students would move from Pines to Apollo Middle School in Hollywood. Another plan would move the same 173 students to Driftwood Middle in Hollywood. Some Driftwood students would then be transferred to Apollo.
Parents said they did not like any of the plans.
"Are there options other than boundary changes?" Stanwood asked Jennifer Gottlieb, a member of the Broward School Board.
"Well, we are looking to see what other options are right now. Actually, for me, that's the big question. There's a lot of unanswered questions as to what our other options are," Gottlieb said.
Some parents said they would like to see more portable classrooms as an alternative.
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