El Paso ISD: Parent feedback on school consolidation low; take online survey here
Results from the El Paso Independent School District’s facility survey don’t appear to be all that great.
Out of 61,000+ students, EPSID has feedback from just 1,000 parents. The stakes are high: the district is considering consolidating 14 elementary schools, and even closing a middle and a high school.
But even so, some believe the district won’t be able to accurately capture how people feel.
“If you say you are going to involve the community and you want them to be involved,” said El Paso Teacher Association President Norma De La Rosa, “don’t give an older generation of people in the community an IPAD and just take the survey. That’s not how they do business.”
EPISD is holding five community meetings to talk about facility options. The district is doing this now, because after commissioning a demographics study, EPISD learned in five years, it will have significantly fewer students and less money. Funding half-empty schools is something the board hopes to avoid.
“The point of doing the survey is to find out what they want to see in their schools,” said EPISD Spokeswoman Melissa Martinez, “what they want, what are their needs.”
But with a number of schools on the chopping block, including Andress High and Irvin High, the district is asking parents be specific about what they’d like to see.
Do they prefer K-8 schools? Do they want to pay for upgrades to other buildings? How do they feel about their kids school being consolidated with one in the next neighborhood?
“But we haven’t looked at the other part of what makes up a campus,” said De La Rosa. “Those schools that may be consolidated into one have two principals. So that means one principal may not have another principal’s job.”
But are parents being reached? Bilingual community meetings that guide parents through the survey are offered. There’s also an online survey, but it’s not that straightforward. The questionnaire requires a worksheet that’s not easy to find.
“If there is someone who has a question in Spanish and they want to take the survey in Spanish, if they need help walking through that survey we can do that as well,” Martinez said.
The next two community meetings are:
Wednesday, Dec. 3 at Coronado High School Fine Arts Auditorium, 100 Champions Place
Monday, Dec. 8 at Austin High School Gym, 3500 Memphis Ave.
The report can be found here.
The online survey and worksheet can be found here.
