School district ‘proximity’ changes could displace more than 1,300 high schoolers
Proposed transportation plan could mean 4.3% of students would need to change schools to ride a bus
More than 1,300 high school students could be affected by a plan to mitigate long bus rides by limiting schools of choice within the Lee County School District’s three school zones.
For the West Zone, the option of choice would displace 53 students at Cape Coral High School, 22 students at Ida S. Baker High School, 136 at Island Coast High School, 47 students at Mariner High School and 34 students at North Fort Myers High School.
New high school transportation options for nest school year were presented to the Lee County School Board this week.
The transportation plan recommended — said to impact the fewest students — would impact a little more than 4%.
“As we continue as a district to examine all processes and procedures, there are points of celebration and points of pain,” Superintendent Dr. Denise Carlin said.
She said the district will continue to enhance the transportation program while meeting the requirements of getting children to school in a timely fashion.
“The work does continue and will continue throughout my tenure,” Carlin said. “We believe this is in the best interest of our school district. The children are well cared for and not on the bus at an unreasonable hour.”
Deputy Superintendent Dr. Ken Savage said the high school transportation optimization and student enrollment plan is an important body of work, as the district has already completed its elementary and middle school proximity plans.
He said one of the challenges for high school transportation the district has students getting on a bus before 4 in the morning for a more than two-hour ride to school.
“We recognize that causes a real challenge from a choice and transportation standpoint,” Savage said. “That’s a very limited resource that we expand in that effort.”
He said they did not want to make a complete boundary change for high school, but rather look at a modest way to make a huge impact on transportation while not disrupting the students.
“Our overreaching goal is to improve efficiency and sustainability of high school transportation and preserving family choice,” Capital Planning Assistant Director Dr. Adam Molloy said.
Families currently have the option to choose from among an average of 4.1 high schools within their assigned and adjacent subzones. The transportation zones currently expand 169 square miles in the West Zone, 287 square miles in the East Zone, and 282 square miles in the South Zone. With these distances, the average bus ride is more than 90 minutes.
“Because of specialized programing these zones cover a significant footprint,” Molloy said.
The district considered four transportation zone approaches for high school students.
The district recommends its fourth option, the 3-1/1-3 elimination approach, which would impact 4.3%, or 1,316 out of 30,427 students.
Savage said this year they noticed an increase in ridership among high school students.
“It appears that there are more high school student’s dependent on that type of transportation. We want to mitigate whatever negative impact we have on families. This gives them time – allows families about four months of notice,” he said.
This model uses 90% attendance threshold in subzones for exclusive transportation.
If 90% or more of the high school’s enrollment falls within two subzones, then those will be the exclusive zones to receive transportation services, excluding barrier islands.
If a high school does not have 90% or more of the school’s enrollment falling within two subzones, then the three East and South zones.
“Island Coast, North Fort Myers and Mariner continue to receive transportation across all three subzones,” he said of W1, W2, and W3 zone.
Cape Coral High School and Ida Baker High School are at 96% threshold, so the subzones would be W2 and W3.
“Students may continue to apply for and attend any eligible program,” Molloy said, adding that if that choice falls outside of the subzone, the district will no longer provide transportation.
Molloy said they will notify the families that are affected and provide clear information on continuation options.
Savage said the plan is exclusive for this year, so it does not tie them into any type of binding long-term for enrollment.
Board member Debbie Jordan said she believes a lot more families are not going to have a choice with certain areas of the district being affected more.
“This is a hard sell,” she said. “There are certain schools more affected than others in certain areas of the community.”
Savage said the district provides vastly more transportation than any other district in Florida because of its programs and education provided.
“We cannot afford to provide a bus for all students to go wherever they are,” he said.
The first option was the most severe option with boundaries having to be redrawn and a student would be assigned to a single high school based on their residential address. This would affect more than half of students, as they would have to be reassigned to a new school.
The second approach would displace 35.3% of students and would present capacity challenges in many subzones.
The third approach is a 10-mile radius – “as the crow flies” circle and the “drive distance.” Molloy said in several cases this extended the routing creating additional challenges for transportation.
To reach MEGHAN BRADBURY, please email news@breezenewspapers.com