The School District plans to move students who live in Arbor Greene & Cory Lake Isles to Hunter’s Green Elem. for 2018-19 school year
**Please note — This story had to be updated after we went to press (on March 17) with our March 24 New Tampa issue. The information about which students the Hillsborough County School District planned to move wasn’t made available to the public or the media until March 21st.
On Thursday, March 30, 6 p.m., officials from Hillsborough County Public Schools will meet with parents at Benito Middle School (10101 Cross Creek Blvd.) to discuss proposed changes to attendance boundaries.
The affected schools will include Pride, Heritage, Hunter’s Green and Clark elementaries. These changes will not take effect for next school year (2017-18), but the following year, starting in August 2018.
Plans outlining the proposed new boundaries were released on the school district’s website on March 21 and are now available at http://www.sdhc.k12.fl.us/doc/251/growth-management/resources/boundary/.
The biggest change in the proposed boundaries is that the students from the University area who currently are being bused into Hunter’s Green and Clark are being reassigned to neighborhood schools closer to their residences to make room for expected growth – about 1,500 homes – in K-Bar Ranch.
Then, the boundaries of the four schools along Cross Creek/New Tampa Blvd., are being adjusted to balance attendance at those schools.
In the proposal, 563 students who live in Arbor Greene and Cory Lake Isles who currently are assigned to Pride will be re-assigned Hunter’s Green, says Lorraine Duffy Suarez, Hillsborough County Public Schools’ general manager for growth management. “We’re changing a lot of students, and I understand that,” Duffy Suarez says. “They have a lot of pride in their Pride, but Pride can’t hold all the students who are going to come there.”
She says moving so many students should give the affected students a measure of reassurance. “The whole neighborhood is moving,” she explains. “You’re going to a different school, but you’re taking 562 of your friends with you. It’s like a big chunk of Pride is now going to be called Hunter’s Green.”
She explains that, while it may be uncomfortable for those who are affected, the change is needed. “We monitor growth, and we know how much growth is coming, and we have to accommodate it,” she says. “Pride was built on land that we bought from K-Bar Ranch. The school was sited there because we knew that development was coming. Now is the time.”
School grades for last year, which are based on test scores, rank Pride and Clark as A schools, Heritage as a B, and Hunter’s Green as a C. For those families moving from Pride to Hunter’s Green, Duffy Suarez says, “You’re not moving from an A school to a C school, you’re taking your A school with you.”
Another proposed change is that students who are residents of the Morgan Creek apartments, just north of the Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. exit off I-75 will move from Hunter’s Green to Clark, which affects assignments for 187 students.
Students who live in most of K-Bar Ranch, who currently are assigned to attend Heritage, will move to Pride. This affects 154 students. Some students who move into areas of K-Bar Ranch that are not yet built, along with students in Easton Park, will remain at Heritage.
Duffy Suarez explains these numbers are not exact. “These are the numbers of students who are assigned to (those) schools,” she says. “Not every kid we assign to a school actually goes there.” Some students attend magnet, charter, or private schools, or are homeschooled.
Jason Pepe, chief community relations officer for Hillsborough County Public Schools, encourages all parents and interested community members to visit a special webpage that’s been set up with frequently asked questions regarding the changes that are happening in New Tampa and surrounding areas. It is available at sdhc.k12.fl.us/doc/1831/universityfaqs.
“The purpose of the FAQs is to be transparent,” says Pepe. “We have shared everything we know at this point and we really want to get this information to as many people as possible.”
Comments from parents and the community will be accepted at the meeting on March 30, as well as via email.
Duffy Suarez explains that the meeting will be “open house” style. “We have tables and stations set up for people to ask questions,” she says. “For example, if you’re being changed, you can go talk to the principal of the school you’re moving to.”
She says they’ll have maps set up, and she and her colleagues will be there to explain the maps to those who attend.
There also will be staffers on hand at the meeting who can answer questions about the process for choosing a different school, rather than their assigned neighborhood school.
“Our purpose in this meeting is to hear from (people who are affected by the changes),” Duffy Suarez says. “We will take written comments, and then we (will) come back and sort through it. We can’t make everyone who doesn’t want to move not move, but we will review comments and rationale and can make changes to the proposals.”
Plans outlining the new proposed school boundaries were released on the school district’s website at sdhc.k12.fl.us on March 21 (after we went to press with our latest issue, hitting mailboxes Friday).
These proposed changes will not take effect for next (the 2017-18) school year, but the following year, starting in August 2018.
“It’s important to recognize that these changes are (only) proposed,” says Pepe. “All boundary changes have to be approved by the School Board.”
Comments from parents and the community will be accepted at the meeting on March 30, as well as via email. Changes may be made based on that input before a final recommendation is made by school superintendent Jeff Eakins to the seven-member School Board.
The School Board is expected to consider the proposed recommendation – including any changes made as a result of comments from the community – at its meeting on Tuesday, May 16.
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