Redistricting Could Shift 1,628 Pupils in Moon District

By Amanda S.F. Hartle

Moon Area school directors will choose from six elementary school redistricting options when they decide on a districtwide plan next month.

But before school board members can view those final options, about 55 redistricting committee members will have their say. Committee members on Monday got their first glimpse at rough drafts that would shift 1,628 grade-schoolers throughout the district’s five elementary buildings.

“What you are seeing is preliminary,” said consultant Donald Boyer of Education Management Group. “There is nothing at this stage that is cut in stone. … We are doing this for informational purposes.”

Boyer’s redistricting options ranged from grade-centric centers to a traditional redistricting with altered school boundaries that his firm said could be problematic.

“The problem is if you are going to carve out part of an area, you are going to have to carve a new piece every year for every grade level,” he said.

Still, keeping neighborhood schools remains vital to many residents, said Superintendent Donna Milanovich.

Most committee members, like Michael Nagy of Moon, have a vested interest in the redistricting. His three children are under age 8 and his second-grader attends near-capacity Bon Meade Elementary.

When his 4-year-old and 2-year-old attend kindergarten, they could be spending their first days at a kindergarten center in Allard Elementary, a kindergarten-through-second-grade school at Bon Meade, a kindergarten and first-grade school again at Allard or they and all other district kindergartners could stay in their neighborhood school before switching to another building in first grade.

And when the youngest Nagy child is just starting school, the eldest most likely would be at a fifth-grade school based centrally at Hyde Elementary.

With the largest geographical area, Bon Meade has 593 students with no empty rooms and 316 single-family homes approved or under construction with many open land plots available for future developments.

Allard contains no vacant rooms and holds 221 students, while sister school Hyde holds 244 with a single empty room. On Moon’s western side, Brooks has five open rooms and 402 students after 177 students left to attend classes at McCormick where there are two empty classrooms.

According to the Moon Economic Development Web site, the district’s newest school with its smallest classes will have 441 new single-family homes in coming years.

Committee members will use that information to recommend the best option, Nagy said.

“There has been a large amount of community input,” he said. “Yes, you have these consultants, but we are sharing our input too.”

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