Ames School Boundary Proposal Keeps Families Together

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Children living in areas impacted by new elementary school boundaries would be able to remain at their current school so long as they were enrolled by the fall of 2013, if the Ames School Board accepts a proposal from the boundary committee at its meeting tonight.

The Ames School Board Boundary Committee will recommend that the school board allow family grandfathering when attendance boundaries for most Ames Elementary Schools change.

Board members met with Parents and Teacher Organizations in April and also took feedback from residents on new school boundaries and more.

Ames School District Superintendent Tim Taylor said no one had issues with the proposed boundaries that will change with the opening of the Miller Avenue school in 2014, but families were concerned about dividing their children among schools.

The committee expects to recommend that “families be given the opportunity to grandfather all their 2013-2014 K-4 elementary students, if they so choose, only in order to allow those students to remain with their cohort group,” the recommendation states.

“Children not enrolled in the District in the 2013-2014 school year will be assigned to their boundary school and will not be grandfathered. If after year one, parents/guardians who desire their students to go to their neighborhood boundary school rather than the grandfather school, may shift their students to the boundary school if space permits.”

The board also expects to approve a $1.4 million plan to purchase laptops for the high school using revenues from the local option sales tax fund. The purchase would be made in July so that each Ames High School student would be assigned a laptop next fall.