WCPSS BOARD OF EDUCATION HAS VOTED !!

Leesville Road Elementary School and Leesville Road Middle School will both be returning to the

TRADITIONAL CALENDAR

beginning in AUGUST 2010.

THANK YOU to everyone who has fought so hard to bring UNITY BACK TO OUR COMMUNITY these past 4 years. It hasn't been easy having our families, our neighborhoods, and our community split onto different schedules, but we will no longer be forced to deal with the division.

THANKS TO YOU,

1 CAMPUS

1 CALENDAR

4 LEESVILLE

is finally a reality again!!

Press Release 2/4/2010

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

One Campus One Calendar for Leesville Still Going Strong

Raleigh, North Carolina, February 4, 2010. The Leesville community is anxiously awaiting the School Board’s decision to return their campus to the traditional calendar for the 2010-11 school year, and the preliminary results from WCPSS’ calendar survey have not slowed their effort in any way. “One Campus One Calendar for Leesville” is a goal that is expected to become reality in just a few short weeks.

Since 2007, parents and staff members in the Leesville community have continued to come together in a grassroots effort known as CCLP (Concerned and Committed Leesville Parents), formed to oppose the year round calendar on the Leesville campus in an effort to keep all of the Leesville schools following the same school calendar.

Last fall, voters turned out in record numbers to elect 4 new school board members who all shared the same vision and made family-friendly campaign promises. The Leesville community pulled together with other voters in District 7 to elect Deborah Prickett, a veteran teacher and former Leesville Road Middle School guidance counselor. Something mentioned frequently by Ms. Prickett during her campaign was her plan to return the Leesville schools to the traditional calendar for the 2010-11 school year, a plan that was cheered by CCLP members and other voters in District 7.

The WCPSS School Board passed a resolution in January 2010 which will finally provide parents a school calendar choice for their children. WCPSS staff members created a school calendar preference survey for all parents in the system, and preliminary results of that survey were released on February 2.

In March, school board members will be making decisions regarding calendar changes for the 2010-11 school year, and the results of the recent calendar survey will be just one of several tools that will be used for this decision making process.

CCLP continues to strongly support having the School Board return both Leesville Road Middle School and Leesville Road Elementary School to the traditional calendar in order to bring calendar continuity back to the community. Preliminary survey results from Leesville Middle School show 60% of parents completing the survey to prefer the traditional calendar, while 63% of parents responding from Leesville Road Elementary School prefer the year round calendar. A major point of contention regarding this survey is the fact that these preliminary results were not broken down to show the calendar preference of just the base families in the schools. For the current school year, 30% of the students attending Leesville Road Elementary School come from outside their base attendance area. “The survey results don’t surprise me, and they certainly don’t discourage me at all” said Lisa Boneham, founder of CCLP. “It is a well known fact that Leesville Middle School never should have been forced to convert to MYR this year, so reversing that conversion for next year is a no-brainer. In addition, with such a large percentage of our elementary school families attending LRES by application, I would have certainly expected them to vote for the year-round calendar. However, what we have in the Northwest area of the county is three year-round elementary schools with an overabundance of unused capacity, and that is clearly a waste of taxpayer dollars. In order to more efficiently utilize the available capacity, one of the three current year round elementary schools needs to be converted to the traditional calendar to handle the demand for traditional seats in the area. Because Brier Creek and Sycamore Creek were both built as year-round schools and Leesville Elementary is physically connected to Leesville Middle and Leesville Road High School, Leesville Elementary is the logical choice to be converted to the traditional calendar this fall along with Leesville Middle School. We deserve calendar continuity on our campus to put families and neighbors back on the same calendar and bring unity back to our community”.

Another CCLP founder Dodie York echoed her sentiments. “Conversion of Leesville Elementary and Leesville Middle is an issue that has divided parents, siblings, and the community” said York. “Parents at the schools are divided between parents in favor of YR, many of whom attend by application, and parents who opposed to YR and want multiple siblings on the same schedule. The community has been divided because many families cannot tolerate children on two different schedules. Many of our neighbors have opted to send children to magnet or private schools. These base families were not given a vote in the recent survey. “

The Leesville community will get their chance to speak to the board members at the Community Engagement Meeting held at Leesville High School on February 23.

-END

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

As we look forward to 2010, we can all feel confident that the majority of the WCPSS School Board members are going to work WITH parents as they implement their family-friendly and education focused changes. They've got big plans, and they are already moving forward to honor their campaign promises. It is refreshing to hear people say they're going to do something and then actually DO it! If you've followed the school board's actions since the 4 new board members were sworn in December 1, they truly LISTENED to parents' concerns, and they are already doing what they said they would during the campaign.

At this point, it looks like all WCPSS parents are going to be surveyed regarding school calendar preference. They understand that the majority of families in Wake County schools desire a traditional calendar, but they want to be able to provide enough year-round seats around the county for the families who do want to attend a year-round school. The results of this survey will be valuable in making long-term decisions regarding justified MYR reversals, and will also assist in deciding which school calendar a newly opened school will follow. Unfortunately, WCPSS staff members do not feel the urgency to return the survey results to the school board soon enough that they will be able to make sweeping changes for all schools for the 2010-11 school year.

In the meantime though, there are short term changes that really need to be made. It would be financially irresponsible to continue operating so many WCPSS schools on the year-round calendar. The decision to convert both Leesville Elementary and Leesville Middle back to the TRADITIONAL CALENDAR needs to be made very soon in order to give families and staff members enough time to plan for the 2010-11 school year. The fact that the vast majority of Leesville families desire a traditional calendar is already clearly understood. Thanks to your involvement in CCLP and your past communications with the school board, there is no doubt that the Leesville families want to have our 3-school campus operating on the same traditional school calendar. In addition to what the majority of our families want, there is an overabundance of available seats at nearby year-round elementary schools and area year-round middle schools for anyone who truly desires a year-round school.

According to WCPSS staff members, it costs taxpayers an additional $100,000+ per year to operate an elementary school on the year-round calendar instead of the traditional calendar, and an additional $150,000+ per year to operate a middle school year-round vs. traditional. Since there are so many available year-round seats in the schools surrounding the Leesville campus, WCPSS will save over $250,000 during the 2010-11 school year alone just by making the decision to return Leesville Elementary and Leesville Middle to the traditional calendar.

The prospect of finally having our campus back on the traditional calendar and having our children all on the same schedule is such a relief to our community. Our new board representative Deborah Prickett is planning to come out to have a question/answer session with the Leesville families in January, and information on this meeting will be sent out by the school PTSAs.

Thank you for staying involved. With the assistance of the new school board, "One Campus One TRADITIONAL Calendar for Leesville" can finally be a reality once again.

All the best to you and your families in 2010!

The real secret to making magic is a bunch of people all working together.
~Tony Jeary

October 2009

CONGRATULATIONS DEBORAH PRICKETT!!

You represent just the kind of positive change we have all been hoping for!

On October 6, 2009 Deborah Prickett was elected to replace District 7's outgoing School Board Representative. Deborah's campaign was focused on her mission of:

Excellence in Education for ALL students

Neighborhood Schools

Calendar Choice for Families

Stable School Assignments

It is no secret that the Leesville community has been subjected to 2 unnecessary and destructive Mandatory Year Round conversions during the past 3 years. We've made the best of an undesirable situation, but with our new School Board Representative coming on board, our community can finally look forward to LOGICAL decisions being made in the future.

Fortunately, we have the undisputable FACTS on our side to support calendar reversals for both Leesville Road Elementary School and Leesville Road Middle School before the 2010-11 school year begins. Mandatory Year Round has been a dismal failure all around Wake County. It's too soon to tell how many of the 23 Mandatory Year Round conversions will be reversed by fall 2010. There are still some people who would prefer a year-round calendar, and there should be seats available around the county for people who desire to attend a year-round school. But, with an over-abundance of year-round seats in the Leesville Community, the most logical and fiscally responsible decision would be to return the entire Leesville campus back to the desired traditional calendar ASAP.

Thank you to everyone who supported Deborah and the other 3 candidates for POSITIVE CHANGE. The future now looks BRIGHT for all students in the Wake County Public School System!!

Mission

To maintain STABILITY for families and bring true CALENDAR CONTINUITY to the Leesville campus by ensuring that all 3 of the Leesville Schools operate on the traditional calendar.

Who Are We?

CCLP (Concerned and Committed Leesville Parents) is a group consisting of parents of children attending the 3 Leesville Schools , parents at elementary schools feeding into Leesville Middle School, and teachers and staff members at Leesville Elementary School , Leesville Road Middle School , and Leesville Road High School . This group is concerned about how the year-round conversions have negatively impacted families, the community, and the education of the children in the Leesville Schools.

How do I get involved?

If you are concerned about having Calendar Continuity and would like to get involved in the effort to maintain a traditional calendar on the Leesville Campus, contact Lisa Boneham at LBoneham@aol.com

How did we get to this point?

Upset about how the mandatory year-round conversion of Leesville Elementary School has negatively affected the Leesville Community, and concerned about the threat of another unjustified and unwanted year-round conversion being forced on Leesville Road Middle School, several hundred Leesville parents are rallying like never before to show WCPSS that operating the entire Leesville campus on the traditional calendar would be a much more logical solution for the community as a whole.

The school assignment plan for 2007-08 called for 22 Mandatory Year Round conversions in the Wake County Public School System. These conversions were supposed to alleviate crowding at schools around the county, and the year-round calendar was forced upon the 22 schools against the wishes of families and staff members in the schools. The justification for these conversions was an anticipated “growth crisis” that had been based on expected growth in Wake County Schools which has not even come close to projections.

At the September 22, 2008 meeting of the Wake County Board of Education, the decision was made to pursue an undetermined amount of Mandatory Year-Round calendar reversals. During the past 2 years, CCLP has continued to stay involved in school issues, with their efforts being focused on having Leesville Elementary School return to the desired traditional calendar. When WCPSS announced that they would consider MYR reversals at “some” elementary schools, it was automatically assumed that Leesville Elementary School would be one of the schools selected to return to the traditional calendar. Besides the fact that over 90% of Leesville families and staff members voted to oppose the MYR conversion in 2007, Leesville Elementary School is part of a unique physically connected 3-school campus where the other 2 schools already follow the traditional calendar. There are currently 2 other year-round elementary schools in the area surrounding Leesville, leaving 731 unused seats between these 3 under-capacity year-round schools.

During the Board of Education’s work session on October 7, 2008, in a shocking motion, Growth Management was asked to include the conversion of Leesville Road Middle School to the year-round calendar as part of the assignment draft for 2009-10. As soon as this news hit the Leesville Community, CCLP heard from hundreds of additional parents interested in joining their organization. These parents were previously unaffected by the Elementary School conversion, but have a strong desire to keep the entire Leesville campus on the traditional calendar. Because the assignment draft is just a preliminary plan, CCLP plans to attend the upcoming Community Engagement Meetings to convince WCPSS to make family-friendly changes to the draft that would restore the entire Leesville campus to the desired traditional calendar.

This hasty motion was made without considering the negative impact it would have on the entire community. This type of unwanted change will not only negatively affect the Leesville Road Middle School families and staff members, it will cause unnecessary hardships on families and staff members at many of the elementary schools feeding into Leesville Middle School as well. It's time to look at the BIG PICTURE and make changes that will actually HELP families, not continue to split them apart.

“Some people are selfishly focused on their current personal situation without giving consideration to what is best for the community as a whole—both today and into the future. The forced year-round conversion at Leesville Elementary School moved many of us from advocating for our own families to becoming unified crusaders for the good of our community” said Lisa Boneham, a founding member of CCLP. “We are planning a vigorous support campaign to prevent further damage to the Leesville families and to restore unity to the Leesville community. It’s been a long 2 years of fighting an unwanted and unjustified change. Nothing worthwhile comes without sacrifice, but seeing our community come together again in such a mass effort means that time building the foundation for this group has been well spent. Now that there is so much excess capacity in Wake County elementary schools, WCPSS has the opportunity to correct the mistake made with so many MYR conversions, and actually make some family-friendly changes for 2009-10.”

Links:

Wake Cares

1Campus1Calendar