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I feel for those students and teachers, especially about harasment from older students. I am sure it is hard on the ones that have to travel. How far apart are these two, about 10-15 miles? That problem should ease when the new semester starts, hopefully they can schedule better.

The same thing (2 campuses) will happen to Northern next year, and not due to a major disaster but to the planning of BOE. NE and NW will host Northern students for the first half of the year(hopefully the school will be ready in Jan). These schools are 30 miles apart and many of the teachers will have to drive back and forth. Of course GCS will pay for travel but the stress on the teachers will be terrible. The students will not even meet each other until Jan. There will be no school unity. Can you imagine that we are going to have sports, but have to transport students for practice etc.

What a mess.. and with the emotional stuff the Eastern students must be having a hard time.

Debora,

You're right and I know that you have sympathized with the North High Point folks, but for the sake of the others reading.....

At least the Eastern kids weren't put into a lottery and sent to schools like Dudley, Page, Grimsley permanently.

quest,

That is true, but what about the 100+ students that are permamently assigned to Eastern that pracically live across the street from Page? The board could have moderated the pain for some of these students by returning them to their neighborhood school. If they had room for an IB Progranm there to bring the students back to that campus from Grimsley, why didn't they have room for these 100+ students? I guess there are different rules for different people with this board, especially if you are in a favored group.

I regret very much the BOE will not face problems square in the face. They only work around the edges and use far too much political input. We need more educators and less politicians. If people would focus on the education of the children rather than social engineering, we would be a lot better off. The HP problem was a great tragedy. The rest of the county relied on High Point representatives to tell the rest of the county what they wanted. It seems reasonable. The lottery is history. We should not forget but we are devoting far too much time to past wrongs. We have got to focus on the future. We owe it to the children.

Joe, when they STOP the social engineering, we will focus on other things. Until then, we will NEVER give up. Remember, the black/white-11-mile-swap is still going on.

Joe,

I agree with you on your previous post, except for one item. You say that the lottery is history, and we must focus on the future. That much is true, but we must not forget that the many of the same politicians that visited the lottery upon us, to serve their own agenda, still are on the board. What I am concerned about is whether they have learned the leassons of history, and are we doomed to suffer them once again. The lottery was cancelled only based upon a technicality, whether usage of government statistics was legal. I do not believe that certain members of the board believed that the lottery failed. As a matter of fact, some of them objected to cancelling the lottery. In summary, we must be vigilant with this board that they do not attempt to conceive similar scams once again to achieve their own ends. That is why we can't just put the past behind us without consideration. We need to remind ourselves regularly of what this board is capable in the pursuit of its goals.

The 11 mile swap has to STOP!

I would strongly recommend against the split campus plan for Northern. You have no idea the impact and stress this type of scheduling places on the Eastern familes.

I don't think we will ever "get use to it". How do you get use to something that is destroying your family? We lost the school to fire....

We are losing something much more important due to scheduling...

it's our families....................

It's a shame for this to happpen when there is an empty building with space for lease just miles from our formal campus. Moving into this facility would put us back on a sane schedule and provide our students with a safe learning environment.

If they are brave enough to ask for 2.5 million dollars for a 40 student culinary program, they should be able to ask for 4-5 million to put
1100 students and over 100 staff back in a safe learning environment with qualified teachers.

They would incur an immediate savings on the cost we are now incurring by doubling of the bus routes, hiring more staff, paying out gas allowances, overtime,and hiring another 90,000 SOR officer.

I would strongly recommend against the split campus plan for Northern. Look at the strain that it is putting on the Eastern familes.

The quotes from school board members like "they will get used to it" are just not good enough. They have said the same things about the Choice plan and the Map C 11 mile redistricting swap.

After my daughter was not allowed to go our local school Southwest, which was 800 yards from our house she was forced to go more than nine miles away to High Point Central. She lost all of her friends! We had to endure this for one year until the board came to their senses and killed the choice plan. My daughter is now back at Southwest with her friends but even today she asks me why did it happen? It was a long year. With my other two children at the Southwest schools this split put a lot of stress on our family.

The school board must do whatever necessary to keep communities and friends together!

They must also put a stop to the 11 mile bussing swap mentioned above and let the Southwest kids and the Andrews kids have their schools back.

The best way to releive stress at Eastern is to bring the new school on-line in 21 months not 33 months. The BOE, so far, has been unwilling to commit to a fast-track 21 month schedule. If you think stress is bad now, wait a year. Does anyone know how may Eastern children xferred to other schools? For some children, this is the thing to do. I thought the Lucent building would be good, however I trust the people who say that the disadvantages out-weigh the advantages. They studied in detail and I am not in position to say they are wrong.

Joe,
A parent and formal Lucent facilities manager has talked with the current owner of this facility.

The current owner has not received one phone call of interest from "anyone" in Guilford county since the fire about the possibility of leasing floors.

I would think if the people you trusted so much had done this research it would have included at least one call to the current owner of the facility.

Why are the Eastern Guilford students, that are within walking distance of this school, not given priority in transferring to Page??

Last year many of these students asked to return to Page, but they were told that there is no room.

How is it possible that there are now 100 seats available for an IB program at Page?

I guess it is just like Central. There is only room for the students they want there. It is the whitest and brightest syndrome, just like toothpaste.

Alan looks after his boyz.

I found this comment interesting.
"Guilford County Schools considered buying the property last year for use as a K-12 school and possibly a central administration building, but the school board "rightly found" the building too big, and the asking price of $80 million (or more) to purchase and renovate the building too much."

It's funny that $80 million is "rightly found to be " too much for three schools. An elementary, middle, high school, and administration offices, when the same school system just spent $47 million for one high school.

$80 million would be equivalent to $20 mil per school and $20 mil for admin offices.

The same board also thinks nothing of spending $2.5 million for 40 students in one of their pet projects.

If $2.5 million was spent on every 40 students at a 1200 student high school it would be equivalent to $75 million dollars.

Just doing the math!!

Also no one has even asked for the numbers to lease the corporate center. Where are the numbers coming from when the owner has not even been asked for a number...not even a ballpark?

M E D I A
A D V I S O R Y

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

E.C. HUEY’S CANDIDACY FOR SCHOOL BOARD
TO BE ANNOUNCED TUESDAY

GREENSBORO (29 November 2006) – Guilford County 2008 School Board at-large candidate E.C. Huey will officially announce the kickoff of his countywide candidacy next Tuesday afternoon at 5:00 p.m. on the sidewalk in front of Guilford County Schools’ Administrative Offices on N. Eugene Street in downtown Greensboro. Mr. Huey will make a brief statement and will take questions from the news media.

Huey will then present remarks to the Guilford County Board of Education at its 6pm regular meeting.

Copies of Huey’s remarks will be made available to media representatives gathered. Supporters of his candidacy are invited to attend.

Commenting on last night’s Board meeting, Huey said, “Tuesday’s Board meeting and debate about the future of Eastern Guilford H.S. proves that there needs to be new leadership on the Board. I heard the “R” word [bond referendum] bantered around last night and I’ve gone on record saying that until the mismanagement of taxpayer money ceases, I will not support a bond referendum. I believe the System needs to be more fiscally conservative in putting its children first.”