Dist. 204 to handle boundary talks in a timely way

Aiming to avoid the "long, drawn-out process" that became the boundary discussions of 2006, Indian Prairie officials are entering the newest round of boundary talks for all three high schools with a new plan and what they hope is a shorter time table.

By Feb. 11, Deputy Superintendent Kathryn Birkett hopes to present the board with a criteria-based boundary recommendation that members intend to approve at a special meeting on Feb. 19, limiting the entire process to less than a month. That timeline, they believe, while considerably shorter than in 2006, still allows several weeks for community input while eliminating the back and forth between neighborhoods.

"I have spent a lot of time since the last time the boundaries have been developed going over what went right, and a lot more went wrong than didn't," said board President Mark Metzger. "I am, at the moment, reasonably convinced that the boundary process that served us very well for a number of years is now irretrievably broken."

"The last time we did this, what we've seen were people coming into the meetings, not only with their preconceived agendas, but often with pre-negotiated deals with another area, and then nothing got done for the entire district," he said.

On Monday, Birkett discussed with the board members the criteria she would use in putting together the boundary package for the anticipated 2009 opening of Metea Valley High School on Eola Road.

The priority, they agreed, is making sure all three high schools have a balanced enrollment and the ability to have equally strong academic bodies representing the characteristics of the district. Along with balancing enrollment, Birkett said she also would avoid splitting students from the majority of their current middle schools more than once.

"I put balancing peak enrollments versus capacity as the first goal," said board member Curt Bradshaw. "I think this is a plan we want to last forever, so peak enrollment I think is incredibly important."

Birkett said any plan she puts forward in two weeks would also be designed to minimize transportation times and costs for both bus-commuting and walking students. That, she said, could likely be accomplished by ensuring the boundaries are contiguous wherever possible.

Board member Alka Tyle said she believes the current process of setting criteria and providing a more controlled public comment forum will only help the district as new ideas come in.

"This plan will help serve the common good of all the students," she said. "I think it would help people if they realized the criteria is not an absolute formula with only one solution, but that they're a set of competing goals that will require compromise for us to reach a consensus. We're going to see there's going to be more than one solution to each of these goals, and it will be up to us to pick the best."

Between today and Feb. 11, the district is seeking input from parents and residents about what criteria they think would be important. After that, the district intends to establish an online feedback component to get comments about the plan Birkett presents on Feb. 11, before the special meeting called for Feb. 19 where board members intend to vote on the final recommendation.

Boundary criteria

Criteria for new District 204 boundary selection:

1. Balance each school's enrollment proportionately to its capacity while leaving room for growth.

2. Maximize the strengths of all three high schools and seven middle schools.

3. Minimize transportation times and costs, non-contiguous boundaries and the number of school splits each student would experience.

Source: Indian Prairie School District 204.

Talks: Officials hope for speedy boundary process