The Battle Ground Public Schools Board of Directors recently approved changes to school configuration that will turn Maple Grove School, currently serving K-8 students, into a K-4 campus.
The approved changes will shift some current Glenwood Primary School students to Maple Grove and some Pleasant Valley primary and middle students to Daybreak schools.
The board approved the changes during their Jan. 14 meeting in an effort to deal with overcrowding in the district. According to a district news release, start and end time changes will be made to bring both Daybreak’s primary and middle schools into alignment with other schools in the district.
Close to 500 students will be affected by the change, according to the district.
Current fifth through eighth-grade Maple Grove students will be divided up based on if they will attend Battle Ground High School or Prairie High School. Glenwood Heights Primary students east of Highway 503, and east of 124th Avenue south of 119th Street will go to Maple Grove.
In addition to Maple Grove’s changes, students at Pleasant Valley primary and middle schools north of 179th Street will attend Daybreak schools.
The board was weighing three options drafted by an overcrowding committee assembled last year. Other than the Maple Grove conversion, shifting boundaries in the south of the district and a more broad shifting of boundaries into north, east and west sections were under consideration.
The board, according to the release, weighed how each scenario would affect student equity in academic opportunities, fiscal responsibility, transportation considerations, weather, and staffing. Three public forums and hundreds of comments from an online survey were part of the process.
Impacted families will receive a letter in February notifying them of what schools their students will attend in the 2019-2020 school year, the release stated. The district is planning spring activities to let students get comfortable with their new schools.
{{tncms-inline content="<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The Battle Ground School District&rsquo;s four southern schools &mdash; Glenwood Heights Primary, Laurin Middle, and Pleasant Valley Primary and Middle &mdash; are feeling the effects of growth.</span></p> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">As of Oct. 1, Glenwood (built for 484 students) had 810 students, Laurin (built for 600 students) had 690 students and the Pleasant Valley campus (built for 993 students) had 1,090 students.</span></p> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">The district tried and failed to pass a construction and renovation bond of $224.8 million in February and April 2018. An $80 million bond also failed in November of 2016.</span></p> <p class="p1"><span class="s1">According to the district, Glenwood could increase by 380 students over the next 10 years, Laurin by 380 to 440 students, Pleasant Valley Primary by 135 to 245 students and Pleasant Valley Middle by 80 to 170 students.</span></p>" id="7e898338-ccc9-49e2-b3bc-317ca4c7fb9c" style-type="fact" title="Overcrowding at a glance" type="relcontent"}}
