Decatur School Board To Hear Report on Transportation Options Tuesday

The Decatur School Board will meet at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 13, and hear a report from the transportation committee.

This report is important because bus schedules directly affect any decisions about when to start and end school -- and issue that has been watched by parents and was itself studied by a separate committee that issued its own report.

The board is not scheduled to vote on start/stop times on Tuesday, but Superintendent Phyllis Edwards discusses the issue in her report to the board:

Our current transportation actions have included the following:

• possibly combining [middle and high school] routes for the 2012-2013 school year;
• examining the effect a 6-12 start/end time may have on other grade levels;
• determining possibilities for combining K-5 routes; and
• reducing bus stops. 

Choices here will include 1) changing start and end times for the [middle school and high school], possibly affecting the other students in the system in some way, or 2) consider holding this information -- keeping times the same, waiting until another school building is opened when more changes to the bus schedule and times may need to be made. 

She notes there's no consensus among parents, teachers and students. This is how Edwards lists the start/stop time options:

Grade         Option one                     Option two

Pre-K          8am-230pm                     8am-230pm

K-3             8am-230pm                     Oakhurst,Winnona Park, 8am-230pm;

                                                         Clairemont, Glennwood, 8:10am-240pm

4/5             8:45am-3:45pm               7:45am-230pm

6-8             8:45am-3:45pm               840am-3:40pm

9-12           8am-3pm                         830am-3:30pm

The board is also going to hear a report about College and Career Readiness Performance Index, which will replace AYP as Georgia’s accountability measure.

The meeting start at 6:30 p.m. in the Central Office/Board Room of the Westchester building at 758 Scott Blvd.