Thursday, April 02, 2009
Roanoke city schools fine-tune attendance zones
The Roanoke School Board will vote next week on the revised attendance boundaries.
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Roanoke School Board members have agreed on what is expected to be the final drafts for new attendance areas.
After hearing from parents at a public hearing last week, and after sorting through e-mails and suggestions that poured in over the past few days, board members refined two rezoning proposals Wednesday in advance of Tuesday's meeting, when the board is expected to vote on one of the plans.
The new maps further ease pressure on Lucy Addison Middle School, which originally was slated to pick up 200 new students, sparking concerns from Addison teachers and parents. Under the revised plans, Addison's enrollment would reach about 550, up from 476 this year.
Parents and teachers also had asked that the school be more diverse, after earlier drafts showed Addison's student body would be 90 percent black. The latest draft redraws the attendance boundary so that many students in the northeast quadrant of the city would go to Addison, increasing its white population.
The latest draft also reduces the number of students assigned to Lincoln Terrace Elementary School by moving some into Huff Lane Intermediate School. It also reduces the number of low-income students assigned to attend Wasena Elementary School.
Board members said they were satisfied with the latest drafts, but held out the possibility that next week's vote could be postponed if school officials discover unexpected problems with the new attendance areas.




