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Is the REAL problem in equality caused by the boundaries or the fact that every 7th grader in the district is given the opportunity to declare which HS they wish to attend?
I believe it would be extremely interesting to see how many students who are enrolled at North are to be attending Central if the boundaries drawn by the board were used. Who has these statistics?
Also, is anyone who is in the North boundary attending Central? Again, who has this data?
I believe the incoming Freshman class at North is a lot larger than Central's. The opportunities afford the students participating in sports/band, etc. seem to be limited at North, while teams/band at Central are begging for participants. Is this caused by the boundaries which were drawn or by the 7th graders (or should I say parents) being able to choose which school their child attends?
If the unequal numbers are being caused by the open enrollment of the 7th graders, then perhaps the board needs to do away with that policy and make each student must go to the school where their home states they should.
By Confused
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Answer to your question
Dear Confused ?–
You have hit on part of the problem. Let me fill you in on more. I?’ve spent the better part of the morning harping on the boosters, but they reap what they sow. Choosing schools is based on a couple of things. First there is academic opportunity. Take the audiovisual program at North. This is quite an innovative program that affords students opportunities they might otherwise overlook. However, this program is only offered at North. Central is screwed. There are others.
Next of course is sports. North promises a much better opportunity for the hundreds of athletes they produce to win college scholarships and assure professional careers as billion dollar athletes, who will of course channel a large percentage of those earning back into the booster program. North has better conditioning facilities and clearly superior venues. Their million dollar press box alone will assure scouts the ultimate in air-conditioned, catered comfort from which they can select their superstars of the future from. Central ?–they get the bleachers.
Well, in order to play sports for North, if you open enroll, you have to sit out the first year. Now that put the Central scourge in their place didn?’t it. This was the big plan to keep Central vermin in their place and not intrude on North turf. Make them sit out a year and lose 25% of the high school qualifications towards college and scholarships.
Guess what happened then! Central sports last year held their own. They did much better than did the more superior funded Gods and Goddesses at North. Even with old uniforms, old training equipment, old band uniforms encouraging them on, old, old, old, they did better. North boosters rationalized that by saying that the strength of Central came from the diehards who insisted that they wanted to graduate from the school they had started at. But the boosters said ?“Wait until next year?”. That slogan worked forever for Buckeye fans.
Guess what happened then! North boosters realized the potential for Central continuing to dominate was too high so they began to pressure the school board to reconsider the one-year sit out for open enrollees. They needed some of the select Central DNA in their bloodstream. Now the board is considering modifying the one-year restriction. The boosters are ecstatic, except for one thing. They want to have a direct hand in who is selected from Central to attend North and willing to compromise potentially trading some athletes back to Central. In other words, if they choose to try to dominate football, they might be willing to sacrifice their chess team. They will see to it that the restriction is waived to get a star quarterback so long as the restriction is waived at Central to get the star chessman.
OK, I admit, I am exaggerating a little here. But I guarantee I am not too far off the mark. Rules were meant to be modified. Policies were meant to be changed. ?“La Cosa Boostra?” as I?’ve read them to be referred to elsewhere in this forum, will control enrollment policies and will control the board.
So Confused, to answer the question you asked first, the real problem in equality is caused by the conspiracy of the apathetic or naive or completely blind school board, the blue bloods and La Cosa Boostra.
By Drip / Hop
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Single Program Classes
A few of your facts are incorrect. Where a single program exists and a student open enrolls for that program - standard conditions do not apply.
It also works both ways - North has the Media program, Central has the Tech Prep program - kids from both schools have the opportunity to participate in any single building program without penalty. How is Central ''screwed'' here?
Standard conditions have been used in many big districts that open additional schools - they are not exclusive to Pickerington & usually are in place for a couple of years - it lets the ''new'' programs develop. New is not necessarily the school but the new coach, new theater director, new music department, etc. Of the 73 seniors last year 70 stayed at Central to participate in Band - that would counter to your argument that everyone wants to go North, in the case of music North needs to get their program established.
The numbers at North would also dictate that there is less opportunity for kids there to participate than at Central, and if Central did alright then every kid there that wanted to play probably had the chance. North will be cutting kids first - is that the better deal if you are the kid that's cut ??
Once North reaches capacity which sounds soon with the Township building & the Dominion purchase you spoke of open enrollment won't be an option - kids that live within the boundary have the priority - that will probably make open enrollment a non issue in the next year or two.
By Tech Prep Parent
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You're right!
Dear Tech Prep Parent,
Thank you for correcting me. I was not aware of the program you speak of. My source was a parent whose child is involved in the programs at North. Open enrollment exists not only in the high school environment, but also in middle school. Parents ready to tear their hair out over the gross inequities and missed opportunities for their kids at Heritage Middle (and I use middle loosely) are open enrolling at both Harmon and Diley. For example, band kids at Heritage have to be transported by parent to Diley at 7:30 am for band practice. PLSD won?’t transport. So now you have kids missing the opportunity to participate in band because their parents actually have to work for a living and aren?’t available as taxis at the school?’s convenience. PLSD has graciously consented to take the kids back to Heritage after all other runs have been completed. They will arrive at Heritage for classes late. They will not be marked late but they will be late.
There are numerous other situations where Heritage gets shortchanged. Notice I didn?’t use the word screwed again. Do you know that PLSD won?’t even pay to erect a sign in front of the middle school part of the building that says Heritage Middle School? Do you know that the kids at Diley and Harmon shun the kids from Heritage telling them they still go to the ''baby school''? One parent in my neighborhood enrolled her brood at Harmon because all her kid?’s coaches told her that without the flow from elementary to North, the kids would have no opportunities after high school. She realizes her kids aren?’t the sharpest knives in the cutlery drawer so she succumbs to this madness. She actually fell for it and now drives them all to and from every day. Another I know moved to the North district for the same exact reason. He is a coach and all coaches were told that they needed to encourage the parents of their best athletes to head towards North. They are now on the verge of bankruptcy with the combined loss from their old new house and the cost of their new new house and the increased cost of booster participation to assure that their kids will be billion dollar soccer stars some day.
Oh well, on a more encouraging note, I believe that the open enrollment issues right now are students wishing to go back to Central. The grass apparently wasn?’t greener. Their high school experience needed more than aesthetics. It needed more than gross sexual misconduct by students. It needed more that drunken throat slashing brawls.
So TP Parent, thank you again for setting me straight. And other readers, thank you for listening to me vent my guts out this morning.
By Drip / Hop
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