Bloomington releasing proposed boundary maps

The year before his son started school, Aaron Dean toured, researched and read up on all Bloomington schools before selecting Normandale Hills Elementary.

Now, he worries all that work may have been futile.

School officials are looking to tighten a longtime "liberal" policy that's given parents the choice of where to enroll their children in Bloomington's schools. It's part of a process to change school zone boundary lines next fall to "right-size" schools that are over or under capacity.

Five possible new boundary maps were to be released today.

"To do a U-turn and take that away when our child is partway through school doesn't make sense," Dean said. "Had we known they would be restricting enrollment ... I don't know we would've bought the house we did. We'll have a decision to make whether we still want to stay in Bloomington schools."

Fifth-graders wouldn't move under the proposed plans, but some 1,000 younger elementary students could change schools next fall.

School district spokesman Rick Kaufman said officials understand parents don't want their choices limited, but he said boundary changes are long overdue.

For example, Valley View Elementary is over capacity; 83 percent of its students qualify for free- and reduced-priced meals and 60 percent are nonwhite. In contrast, Poplar Bridge Elementary is 67 percent full; 13 percent of students qualify for free- or reduced-priced meals and 22 percent are nonwhite.

23 years since last change

The last time school boundaries were changed in Bloomington was 1987. That year, the district also adopted a policy for intra-district transfers, which allows families in one school's attendance zone to choose to attend a different school in the district.

That policy, along with growth on the east side of the city, has contributed to schools being off-kilter by capacity and socio-economic status.

Of elementary students except for those in Hillcrest Community School, 24 percent are intra-district transfers.

Depending on how much officials change the policy, all those children may have to attend their neighborhood school next fall.

"They're taking an approach that basically wipes the slate clean on enrollment," Netzer said. "They're really losing the picture of today's education, where parents want to have a choice."

He and his wife Lisa are rallying parents to petition the school board not to limit parents' choice and instead to phase in changes.

Parents also take issue with the district backing off a magnet school concept it was considering. The district is dropping the plan after losing a bid for a $4.6 million federal grant that would've funded two magnet schools. Officials say Hillcrest will remain a "quasi-magnet" with an arts emphasis.