Solutions: School Assignment Plan

Many have issues with the JCPS school assignment plan, whether it be logistical, geographical, or the performance of the school one’s student is assigned to. My suggestions? Well, we’ll get to that.

This is hopefully the first of a weekly series where I present an issue affecting our fine city, and you, dear readers, will suggest solutions in the comment section. I, along with Rick and the other contributors, want this to be a site where readers and contributors interact with one another. All the better if our conversations lead to something more.

I’m not much bothered about the feasibility of your suggestions. I’m not even bothered if you suggest sci-fi solutions; after all, they may trigger an idea that is feasible. Just put something out there.

My ideas are thus:

1. Schools are grouped geographically, and students within those areas are assigned to a school only within that area, but make the areas fairly large, so we won’t be segregated by neighborhood. It would cut down on driving time for everyone!

2. Use Transporters, a la Star Trek, rather than those silly, gas-guzzling buses. It’s good for the environment, too!

3. Give those students books for those long bus rides! Make each bus like a book club, and keep a box of the month’s chosen book on the bus. It’s much cheaper than an iPod, and we’ll improve literacy rates!

4. Make sure each school has adequate facilities, plenty of current, factual textbooks, updated equipment, and intelligent, creative teachers. In short, get our public schools on an equal footing.

5. More magnet programs. Shawnee has an excellent one: the flight magnet. Students get their private pilot’s license for free. Exciting magnet programs that will give students a skill or a trade will draw people from all over the county. That’s what got me, after all.

Now it’s your turn.