Wake school board approves moving 1,600 students to new schools next year under approved reassignment plan

About 1,600 Wake County students will be assigned to new schools in the coming school year after the county school board approved an annual reassignment plan intended to manage the growing district’s headcount.

2023-11-20

The Wake County Board of Education approved, without opposition, its student assignment plan for the 2024-25 school year, hours after the system staff presented its final iteration of the plan during an afternoon work session. The final plan made few changes from pervious drafts.

Wake parents can look up their school assignment for next year using the school system’s website. Families who are affected will receive individual messages early next week from the school system about what they can do if they want to stay in their current schools. Eligible families can apply to stay between Nov. 29 and Dec. 13.

The plan will affect 1,572 students, less than 1% of the system’s 160,000 students. About three-quarters of them will be able to apply to stay at their current school. System officials originally said the reassignment plan would have affected a similar percentage of students as previous plans have, about 2% to 3% of students.

"It is not an easy decision for us to move families at all and that’s not what we want," board member Cheryl Caulfield said. But because of transportation and crowding issues, the change is best for the system in the long run, she said.

It's difficult to balance families' wishes with state class size requirements, booming growth in certain areas and bus driver shortages, board Vice Chairman Chris Heagarty said.

Some board members cautioned parents against worrying that their child will be moved to a worse school.

Chairwoman Lindsay Mahaffey said her children were reassigned to a school a few years ago that people warned was worse but she's found the school to be a good experience.

"Change is hard and change is scary, but you will find high-quality teachers and folks who will love on your kids, just like I had when my kids had to move schools," Mahaffey said.

No parents spoke against the proposal during the meeting Tuesday, though they'd flooded several meetings already this fall. At the last public hearing, many said they believed school system officials had made up their minds already.

The plan is expected to move students from 21 schools into new schools, largely to relieve overcrowding and reduce busing routes during a bus driver shortage. It will also eliminate many options for families assigned to year-round schools to apply for their children to attend traditional calendar schools. The move is in part designed to reduce busing routes for those calendar-transfer students.

The assignment plan mostly moves students from schools across Wake County to schools closer to them. In some cases, neighborhoods were assigned farther away years ago, in part to increase economic diversity in schools. Most changes have drawn little criticism, and some have been welcomed by people wanting shorter school commute times.

However, hundreds of families have protested a few parts of the reassignment plan, including many in three fast-growing areas: Morrisville, Garner and Holly Springs. For many of the families, they’ll be reassigned to elementary schools farther away from their current schools. Families there have said they like their current school and don't want to disrupt their children's education.

In Morrisville and Holly Springs, many families won’t be eligible to apply for a transfer to stay at their current school next year. Some of them, in the first two drafts, would have been forced to switch calendars, from a year-round school year to a traditional school year in Morrisville and from a traditional to a year-round in Holly Springs.

The final draft presented Tuesday removed the calendar switch for many families in Morrisville. The board approved that change.

System officials decided to recommend a year-round school calendar, versus a traditional fall to spring calendar, for Pleasant Grove Elementary School. That school, under the approved assignment plan, will lose most of its student body to other schools and receive hundreds of students from schools that are currently year-round. The school is currently on a traditional calendar.

An informal survey of families who will be moved to Pleasant Grove Elementary found that 137 families (57%) preferred the year-round calendar, compared with 98 families (41%) preferred a traditional calendar.

Earlier this fall, school board members said they wanted to see a solution for families that would have allowed them to stay on the same school year calendar. They wanted to prevent, for example, parents of an elementary school student and a middle school student from having to be on a traditional elementary school calendar but a year-round middle school calendar.

On Tuesday, Heagarty said he was concerned that some Morrisville students could be moved to a new elementary school, start middle school and be moved to a new middle school once Parkside Middle opens up in 2026.

That’s likely to be very few students, system officials said.

The school system can form a plan for 2026 that would avoid reassigning those students again, said Glenn Carrozza, assistant superintendent of school choice, planning and assignment. It would be easier to accommodate for those students once the school system knows how many would end up being affected when the middle school gets closer to opening, he said.

The school system didn’t propose any changes from the first draft assignment plan released in September to the second draft released in October. Since October, school system officials have solicited more online comments, held additional information sessions and held a public hearing.

The school system weighed some other solutions before drafting its plan earlier this fall, said Susan Pullium, the district's assignment director. But some neighborhoods were left alone after officials decided they were too far away to from where the system wanted to move students, she said.

Most families who don’t want to move to a new school can apply for a stability transfer to stay at their current school, without busing, from Nov. 29 through Dec. 13. All applications submitted during that time frame will be approved.

Some younger students won’t be eligible.

More information on transfers can be found on the school system’s website.

A reshuffling in Holly Springs

The biggest moves for next year are being made to fill the new Woods Creek Elementary in Holly Springs. The plan will make Woods Creek a multi-track, year-round calendar school for 924 students. Multi-track schools have multiple groups of students attending the same school at different times of the year. How many tracks the school would have would depend on enrollment projections closer to opening.

The plan moves students out of traditional-calendar Apex and Oakview elementary schools and multi-track calendar Holly Springs Elementary. All three are over capacity.

A fourth school — multi-track calendar Oak Grove Elementary — will also receive students from Holly Springs Elementary as a part of the move. Oak Grove, in Raleigh, is well under capacity. Without moving students into Oak Grove or Woods Creek, Holly Springs Elementary is projected to have 34% more students than it was built for in two years. The school will be at 91% capacity in two years.

Fewer calendar options

Under the approved plan, families at 22 year-round schools will no longer have the option to apply for their children to attend a traditional-calendar school. Families at 12 schools will have their options reduced.

Families with children already attending a traditional-calendar school via transfer can apply for a stability transfer to stay at that school. Families at year-round schools can still apply for their children to attend a traditional-calendar school under a hardship transfer, as well. But in both cases, the students won't be eligible any longer for busing to the school.

Elementary school changes

• Some students will be moved out of overcapacity Banks Road Elementary in Raleigh to neighboring West Lake Elementary in Apex. Both schools’ calendars are single-track year-round. Single-track year-round means there’s only one group of students attending school on the same calendar. Multi-track, by contrast, means students are divided onto different schedules throughout the year.
• A portion of students in Raleigh who are assigned to Carpenter Elementary in Cary will be reassigned to Olds or Combs elementary schools in Raleigh. They will move from a multi-track year-round calendar to a traditional calendar.
• Some Leesville Road and Southeast Raleigh elementary school areas will be rezoned to Hunter, Joyner or Powell elementary schools. All are traditional calendar schools in Raleigh.
• A portion of Durant Road Elementary families neighboring Partnership Elementary’s assignment zone will be moved into the Partnership Elementary assignment zone. That will actually increase overcrowding at Partnership Elementary, but the plan will also reassign families to the elementary school that’s closer to them. It will require a change to a modified calendar.
• Some Sanford Creek Elementary students living south of Interstate 540 will move into Durant Elementary, a school that’s closer to them. The move will also reduce overcrowding at Sanford Creek. Those students would move from a multi-track year-round calendar to a single-track year-round calendar.
• Pleasant Grove Elementary in Morrisville is the focal point of several changes. A portion of its attendance zone will be reassigned into Brier Creek, Leesville Road, Stough or York elementary schools in Raleigh. Then, parts of Alston Ridge and Parkside elementary schools, in Cary and Morrisville, will be reassigned to Pleasant Grove Elementary. The changes are intended to reduce some overcrowding at the schools.
• Portions of Bryan Road Elementary’s assignment zone will be moved to Aversboro, Rand or Vance elementary schools. It would realign attendance zones in a way that makes all of the zones one connected area, instead of two unconnected areas, while reducing some overcrowding. Some of the affected families will move to a single-track calendar while others would stay on a traditional calendar.

Middle school changes

• Some students from Apex and Apex Friendship middle schools will be moved into the under-capacity Lufkin Road Middle School in Apex. That will change those students’ calendars from traditional to multi-track year-round.
• The same pocket of Raleigh families who will be reassigned from Carpenter Elementary in Cary to Raleigh-based elementary schools will also be reassigned from Alston Ridge Middle in Cary to either Centennial or Martin middle schools in Raleigh. Those will require calendar changes.
• Some Centennial and Leesville Road middle school families will be reassigned to either Ligon or Martin middle schools. Those are the same neighborhoods that will be reassigned from Leesville Road or Southeast Raleigh elementary schools. Families moving out of Centennial will move to a traditional calendar.
• A portion of Durant Road Middle families neighboring Moore Square Magnet Middle School’s assignment zone will be moved into the Moore Square assignment zone. That will actually prompt overcrowding at Moore Square but will reassign families who reside inside the Interstate 440 belt line to a middle school that’s somewhat closer to them. That’s the same area that would be reassigned from Durant Road Elementary to Partnership Elementary. It will require a change to a modified calendar.

High school changes

• Some Leesville Road and Southeast Raleigh high school students will be reassigned into Broughton or Enloe high schools under the approved plan. Those are the same neighborhoods that will be reassigned out of Leesville Road or Southeast Raleigh elementary schools and Leesville Road or Centennial middle schools. The high school students reassigned will move to traditional calendars.