News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
The Putnam County School Board voted to prohibit priority three and four enrollment at the county’s elementary and middle schools as of this week.
Priority three students are siblings of students already enrolled in a school. Priority four students are those who live outside the designated school zone. Attendance Supervisor Chris Pierce recommended allowing all enrollments at the three high schools.
The school board tabled a request to consider allowing 16 elementary school students to enroll at the school of a sibling. Ten requests were made at Sycamore and three each at Algood and Prescott South. Some of the students had been affected by the redrawing of district lines to reduce overcrowding, especially at Algood and Prescott.
Director of Schools Corby King said priority three enrollment has not been allowed at Algood or Prescott for three or four years.
“Zoning is near and dear to my heart,” School Board Member Kim Cravens said. “I lived through over-crowding and it’s no fun. It’s not fun when you have people who move into an area and they get told they can’t go to that school because it’s full. And it’s full of people who don’t live in the zone.”
Several school board members asked for clarification on whether the requests were from those who been drawn out of the district. Others might be families who had simply chosen to enroll outside their assigned zone and now had a sibling wanting to attend the school. School Board Chair Dr. Dawn Fry said the board has previously said no to families who made that choice.
“And if we change that, we set a precedent we’re going to have to continue,” School Board Member David McCormick said.
Pierce will provide more detail on those student requests at the June 25 meeting.
A total of 698 Putnam County students have pre-enrolled for kindergarten. Pierce said that is the same exact number as last year. He said the system expects about 200 more kindergartners to enroll before the first day of school based on past numbers.
