Middle School Boundary Adopted
On Thursday night at its regular meeting, the Snoqualmie Valley School Board approved new middle school attendance boundary lines, adopting the recommended Option F.
The adopted option feeds all of Cascade View’s (CVES) 5th grade students and current 6th and 7th graders in its attendance boundaries to Twin Falls Middle School beginning next year. Students in Snoqualmie Elementary School (SES) boundaries will now attend Chief Kanim Middle School.
Currently, all of CVES students and about half of SES students attend Snoqualmie Middle School, which closes at the end of the year and transitions to Mount Si High School’s Freshman Campus in the 2013/14 school year.
Along with the this adopted boundary option comes a stipulation for up to 75 open enrollment slots at Chief Kanim Middle School. Option F leaves enrollment at the two school unbalanced, having a predicted 140-170 more students feeding to TFMS.
Many Cascade View families voiced a desire to attend Chief Kanim, the geographically closer school to Snoqualmie Ridge. With this open enrollment option, the populations at the two school could become more balanced.
The open enrollment slots will be filled with a “controlled lottery,” said school board member Carolyn Simpson. At a later date, the district will provide intra-district transfer forms and a due date for the request submission. Then the district will fill the CKMS open enrollment slots with a lottery – if more apply than spaces available.
It is possible bus transportation will be provided to the Chief Kanim transfer students. Current district policy is that transfer students provide their own transportation.
Presently, around 23 students are open enrolled (on transfer) at Chief Kanim. Those students will be grandfathered next year, leaving about 52 slots open to other interested families.
According to the SVSD website, “The district will be notifying families impacted by the change next week. At the same time, information will be provided about the period of Open Enrollment for families that are interested in transferring from the Twin Falls Middle School attendance area to the Chief Kanim Middle School attendance area. This will involve a 2-3 week window for accepting transfer request applications.”
Cascade View Getting New Portable Classrooms
It was also stated at Thursday’s board meeting that SVSD will spend approximately $100,000 on a new double-wide portable (equivalent of two additional classrooms) for Cascade View Elementary. Impact fees will be used for the expenditure.
Cascade View already has four portable classrooms, which were added in the school’s second year of operation. Those 2006 portables increased CVES capacity from about 550 (designed capacity) to today’s 660 student capacity.
The district expects Cascade View to exceed capacity next year; creating the need for an additional portable to increase CVES capacity to 700+.
District administration also recommended the board highly consider adding an elementary school to next year’s (possible) school bond. The need for a 6th elementary is rooted both in increasing elementary enrollment and Washington State’s move to full-day kindergarten in 2016. This would be in addition to a Mount Si expansion/modernization or new middle school.
