The Sylvania Schools Parent Organization president is speaking out against the district’s plan to redraw school boundaries ahead of a board vote set for June 12.
Shannon Szyperski is one of about 25 community representatives on the school’s redistricting task force formed in January to come up with a way to alleviate crowding in the district’s west-side classrooms and plan for future growth in the district of about 7,500 students.
On May 1 the task force, with a 22-0 vote, agreed a blend of the two scenarios they’d been debating for months was the best way to move forward after they couldn’t build consensus on either option that was on the table.
The hybrid plan calls for keeping grade levels as-is in each building while adjusting boundaries so that students will stay together from kindergarten through high school.
The redistricting will take effect the 2018-19 school year.
But Mrs. Szyperski said she didn’t cast a vote on May 1 because the plan was first presented “at the eleventh hour” at an April 24 school board meeting “without the task force’s prior knowledge,” according to a Facebook post she wrote on Tuesday.
Mrs. Szyperski said Thursday she did not want to comment beyond what she said in her eight-paragraph post, which has been shared on Sylvania community Facebook pages and by other parents on social media.
“I couldn’t bring myself to vote for something I had just seen for the first time, I had very little knowledge of, and that would set the tone for our district moving forward,” Mrs. Szyperski wrote. “I also didn’t like it and didn’t think it was a fair, sensible approach.”
Mrs. Szyperski’s concerns about the hybrid plan echo those of parents from the Grove Bell and Sylvan Lakes neighborhoods who have made public comment at recent school board meetings. The group believes the hybrid plan unnecessarily splits up friends and neighbors and creates bus routes that are too long for some.
Under the hybrid plan, several neighborhoods will send students to schools farther from those they attend now.
“I think the board is trying to be compassionate and understand the parent, but it’s not just about the fact that they’re making our kids move, they’re making decisions that don’t make sense,” said parent Kori Walsh, who lives in Grove Bell. “It’s the financial thing. I don’t know how it makes sense to bus the kids back and forth across the district.”
Some parents also complained they were not given enough time to process the hybrid plan and share their thoughts, but board members contend they’ve given the community ample time to make their opinions known by postponing their decision from May 22 to June 12.
The board has provided time for public comment and received dozens of emails, and it’s time now to vote, board President Stephen Rothschild said.
He added that not all feedback has been negative and said many on the task force support the hybrid plan.
“The decision rests with the board and always has,” he said. “We’re at a point where both sides have had the chance to say what’s good about it, what’s bad about it.”
Mr. Rothschild expects the board will come to a consensus June 12 both on redistricting and on a grandfathering plan aimed at allowing kindergarten through eighth-grade students the option not to change schools.
Contact Sarah Elms at: selms@theblade.com or 419-724-6103 or on Twitter @BySarahElms.
First Published May 26, 2017, 4:00 a.m.
