Some Wake parents get time to weigh school options

Raleigh, N.C. — Parents of about 4,500 Wake County public school students will have the opportunity to apply to year-round or magnet schools, beginning Friday.

Earlier this month, the school board converted year-round calendars at four schools to traditional calendars based on results from a district-wide survey gauging parents' attitudes toward their children's school calendar assignments.

Leesville Road Elementary and Leesville Road Middle schools in Raleigh and Mills Park Elementary School in Cary will switch to a traditional calendar beginning in the fall. Mills Park Middle School in Cary will also open on a traditional calendar.

Parents with students assigned to these schools have until March 18 to apply to their school's calendar option or to a magnet school.

Sycamore Creek Elementary School is the calendar option for Leesville Road Elementary; Durant Road Middle and East Cary Middle schools are options for Leesville Road Middle; Highcroft Elementary School is an option for Mills Park Elementary; East Cary Middle School is the alternative for Mills Park Middle.

Letters were sent home this week to affected students' families outlining their options, the school system said.

The additional time means parents who submitted applications earlier this year won't receive their assignments until April 8. They will have until April 28 to decline their offer.

21 Comments

WRAL.com welcomes your comments on this story. All comments are moderated prior to publication based on our posting guidelines. Please review them prior to posting and if your message is not approved.

VIEW ALL 21 COMMENTS

This story is closed for comments. Comments on WRAL.com news stories are accepted and moderated between the hours of 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Latest Comments

I am so tired of the school board (all of them) that I could spit. Politicians should not be making decisions about our schools; people who know about the process of educating students should. The previous school board made parents angry because their decisions were based on what was best for the budget, not the students. This school board is making decisions on what is best for their popularity; not what is best for students. They cannot even be civil to one another. How on earth can we trust them to be civil to our students?

jnc67
March 11, 2010 7:41 p.m.

Melanie, please do not tell me you are that blind. First, as the spouse of a teacher who works at an inside the beltline school, their are plenty of F&R students at the school. So the fallacy that those students are not at inside the beltline schools, is completely blind. Second, instead of WCPSS spending money on crazy conversions, perhaps they should spend it maintaining their existing schools, since my wifes school had no A/C today. 3. "See a Mess" has not been a booming success. Ask the teachers, and parents there. 4. Neighborhood schools are not great, ask the folks in KC. That was supposed to be a shining example for neighborhood schools, well based on talking to folks from there, and today's news, I would say not!

Please come with actual facts before you post...Thanks!

mindofreason
March 11, 2010 7:04 p.m.

I dont know how the parents feel about Leesville elementary..but didnt the board base their decision on parent response? Also..millions of dollars weren't spent to convert those two schools. They spent 3.4 million converting all the schools that converted. I can totally understand why you would be upset. I do like year round as well. Our school had a 92% favorable year round calendar!

MelanieK1025
March 11, 2010 6:39 p.m.

the new board is wasting taxpayer money. we spent milliions to convert Leesville elementary and middle. The elementary parents and kids are happy with the calendar. The middle schools kids will soon be aged out to HS....why bother switching and spending more money to revert the schools back, spend more money at the other schools to accomodate increased enrollment.

Very short term irresponsible thinking.

rand321
March 11, 2010 6:20 p.m.

Sorry but some of the parents at that meeting were behaving like animals. I was there and I saw those that oppose this board literally bully supporters of neighborhood schools. That is just wrong. Sorry but neighborhood schools are wonderful. It is about time that the inside the beltline families stop getting their way of dumping the lower income families into district 2 Garner schools and allow those lower income children to go to school in their community. The new board is changing things up...is it going to work? I hope so....if it is anything like what it did for Charlotte...it will be a booming success.

MelanieK1025
March 11, 2010 6:19 p.m.