D-11 will keep busing kids/ Some parents disappointed with board's

0 Comments | Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Mar 13, 2003 | by DEEDEE CORRELL

Colorado Springs School District 11 will continue to bus its "overflow" students from two northeast elementary schools to two others to cope with growth in the area, the school board decided Wednesday.

Some children who live near Martinez and Scott elementary schools will keep riding buses to the more distant King and Rudy elementary schools until the 2005-06 school year, the board decided unanimously.

Board President Waynette Rand said she doesn't like busing the children but the decision is the correct short-term solution until district officials can decide how to address growth issues in the long term.

The decision disappointed parents from the Wagon Trails, Sundown and Antelope Creek communities, who said their children have a right to attend their neighborhood school.

The group submitted a petition with about 550 signatures asking the district to move children in the Old Farm neighborhood to Rudy instead of busing them to Scott.

The parents said the school board erred in 1998 when it ignored a boundary study and decided to send Old Farm children to Scott rather than Rudy.

Old Farm parents said their children have had to change schools repeatedly and don't want them to move again.

"We're not against Rudy. We're against having to move again," parent Bill Parker said.

The task now is to persuade voters to approve a bond issue to build a school, he said. The district unsuccessfully asked voters to approve a $96.7 million bond issue last year, part of which would have been used to build a school. The district has not made a formal decision to pursue a bond election in 2004, Rand said. "I'd hope it would be one of the long-term solutions, but it's not a done deal," she said. Jennifer DeVries, one of the parents who urged changing the busing situation, was glad to know where the board stands on the issue. Her side might have lost, but she doesn't consider the matter settled. "We're not going anywhere," she said.