River Trails District 26 ices grade centers

After almost 20 River Trails parents slammed the idea of grade centers Tuesday, the District 26 school board voted down the idea with a 5-2 vote.

About 150 parents applauded the vote, but it came with a cost. Now parents and school board members must repair hurt feelings and forget accusations that flew back and forth across the school board table during the past few months.

"Everything just started out on the wrong foot way back at the very first meeting," said parent Michael Bailey after the meeting. "Everyone was so heated. From now on they should try to be respectful of what other people are saying."

The move would have affected the district's two elementary schools, Euclid and Indian Grove. If grade centers had been implemented, all prekindergarten through second-grade students would have gone to one of the schools and all third-through fifth- graders would have attended the other. River Trails Middle School would not have been affected.

The school board had been discussing switching from neighborhood schools to grade centers for months in a highly charged atmosphere that included packed board meetings and accusations of racism against some opponents of the change. About half of Euclid's student body is Hispanic, compared to less than 10 percent of Indian Grove's.

School board members Alex Carrillo, Steve O'Mara, Thomas Fallucca, Donna Nasser and Becky Reese voted against grade centers Tuesday, while Jeff Bradley and Donna Johnson voted in favor of the idea.

Bradley said the school board "missed an opportunity to go from good to great" by sticking with neighborhood schools.

"A lot of people (in favor of grade centers) were turned off by the viciousness and didn't want to come to these meetings," Bradley said. "School districts need to move forward and we missed a chance to do that tonight."

But board members like O'Mara said there just wasn't enough evidence on the side of grade centers to make the switch.

"There are facts on both sides, but there just doesn't seem to be enough evidence for me," he said. "Especially when it comes to finances."

A few months ago, school board members were given a petition signed by more than 1,000 parents against grade centers. On Tuesday, no parent spoke in favor of the idea.

Despite the vote, parent Frank Fiarito will start gathering signatures to put the issue on November's ballot as an advisory referendum to show board members how opposed to the idea of grade centers parents were.

"I'm very happy with the vote, but we do need to repair this rift between the board and our community," Fiarito said. "There just isn't any kind of open dialogue."

Most elementary districts in the area use neighborhood schools, including Arlington Heights District 25, Mount Prospect District 57 and Des Plaines District 62.

Centers: No parents in favor of switch were present