New District 300 borders taking shape

A new high school, construction at two other high schools and renovation plans for four of the five middle schools have left many Community Unit District 300 parents wondering where their kids will attend school next year.

Some of that uncertainty was lessened last week when the district's Attendance Boundary Committee sent three proposals for middle and high school boundaries to the school board.

Throughout the district, 1,400 homes, and the hundreds of kids who live in them, would be affected by at least one of the three options, the district has estimated.

Parents already have expressed concerns about the proposed boundaries, but committee members stressed that they are just recommendations.

"The school board can do whatever they want," committee member Debby Sosine said.

Among the changes that have been proposed, according to Sosine:

• Most children who live in Gilberts or west of Gilberts would attend Hampshire High School.

• Some kids near the western boundary of the at-capacity Dundee-Crown High School would be shifted to Jacobs or Hampshire high school.

• Some Jacobs students would be moved from the near-capacity high school to Hampshire.

• Dundee Middle School would split roughly equally between all three high schools.

• Pingree Grove kids would move from Dundee Middle School to Hampshire Middle School and eventually attend Hampshire High School.

• Algonquin Middle School may split between Jacobs and Hampshire.

Boundary committee members will present the three proposals to the board and the public at 7:30 p.m. Monday at Lake in the Hills Elementary School.

The school board will weigh the options and vote on one of them by late January, according to the district.

District 300 has sent letters to affected homes and will send out more if it has missed any, district officials said.

The district is revisiting its middle and high school boundaries a year after it redrew its boundaries for its elementary schools.