‘Students are being yanked.’ South Charlotte parents say new CMS maps bring surprises

Maggie Donofrio chose her job for a reason: she’s a stay-at-home mom so she can be involved in her three children’s schools.

Donofrio participates in the parent-teacher association at Polo Ridge Elementary and volunteers several hours a week on school campuses. She’s even proctoring the state’s End-Of-Grade tests.

Lately, she’s spent her days thinking about the work it’ll take to start a parent-teacher association and build a community at two new schools in the next few years. But Donofrio says Superintendent Crystal Hill’s final recommendation for south Charlotte relief school boundaries blindsided her and hundreds of parents at Polo Ridge Elementary.

The recommendation released last week assigns Polo Ridge to the new relief high school and the majority of families to the new relief middle. It’s a change from earlier drafts and a continuation of a trend: as CMS addresses complaints in one swath of south Charlotte, it stokes new complaints elsewhere.

“Our community was quiet because the drafts before the recommendation made sense,” Donofrio said. “Happy people don’t complain. We were all caught off guard. We didn’t see this coming. Now, we’re not happy.”

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools board is scheduled to vote on the south county relief schools boundaries on June 6 and have a public hearing Tuesday on the final proposal. But a petition Donofrio started on change.org asking the school board delay the vote had more than 2,100 signees as of Monday afternoon.

That’s not going to happen, says school board member Jennifer De La Jara.

“The vote will not be delayed because staff has critical work that has to be done over the summer based on the changes,” De La Jara told The Charlotte Observer. “However, I absolutely agree with the frustrated parents. Some of these areas have never been up for consideration so it seems disingenuous to spring this on them at the last minute.”

De La Jara says she hopes parents speak out during the board meeting in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Center Tuesday. Options facing the board include adoption of Hill’s proposal, rejection and/or modification.

As of Monday afternoon, 92 people were signed up to speak at Tuesday’s public hearing. Charles Jeter, executive director of government affairs, policy, and board services, is expecting well over 100 speakers by the time the hearing starts.

How CMS came up with south Charlotte plan

The district has worked for months to come up with a plan on how it will redraw the lines in south Charlotte to relieve overcrowding at multiple schools. And it started over this year after facing opposition in 2022.

The new relief high school will open in August 2024 to relieve overcrowding at Ardrey Kell, Myers Park and South Mecklenburg high schools. A new relief middle school is planned for opening in August 2025 to relieve overcrowding at Community House, Jay M. Robinson and Rea Farms middle schools.

But its effects will be wider than that. Hill’s recommendation will impact roughly 27 schools.

Each draft has been met with some praise — but much more discontent from families who are worried about socioeconomic diversity and home-to-school distance.

“When we hear from parents that they don’t want to move their child from a different school, I take that as a compliment,” Hill told the Observer. “I think that’s huge. The reality is we live in beautiful Mecklenburg County. People are coming here. We’re a growing community. We are going to have to shift boundaries.”

That’s not how parents see it.

“There has been limited opportunity for public input on the most recent draft,” Donofrio said. “Our voices have not been heard or taken into account. There are drastic changes to our school community that didn’t previously exist.”

Venket Raman, a father of two in the current Polo Ridge-J.M Robinson-Ardrey Kell feeder, says it’s unfair to see new changes to schools in his area in a final recommendation.

“We have no time as parents to raise concerns,” Raman said.

If the recommendation is approved, one of his children will go from a 20-to-30-minute commute one way to Ardrey Kell High to an hour commute to the new high school, Raman estimates.

“It makes no sense,” Raman said. “There are so many other (neighborhoods) closer to the new school.”

‘Our students are being yanked’

Polo Ridge Elementary parents aren’t the only ones upset by changes in Hill’s recommendations not previous drafts.

Mary Lauren Kennedy is part of a group of Alexander Graham Middle families slated to go to Myers Park High. But in Hill’s proposal, that small group will be moved to South Mecklenburg High.

“The AG-MP feeder pattern has not been altered on any map in the past 14 months, yet at the final hour, our students are being yanked,” Kennedy told the Observer. “Our families with students in both middle school and high school will face logistical challenges pertaining to bell schedules and after school activities that can easily be completely avoided by keeping us on the same campus.”

READ MORE: 5 things to know about final CMS maps for south Charlotte

CMS officials say they have heard from more than 3,000 parents about the south county relief changes. And Dennis LaCaria, the executive director of facilities and real estate planning, says they’ve made sure to broaden their reach to get a good sampling of public opinions.

LaCaria says Draft 1, released in March, focused on avoiding split feeder patterns. The response to that scenario was that CMS had missed the mark on socioeconomic diversity and school utilization.

LaCaria says Draft 2, released in April, took diversity concerns seriously.

Hill says CMS intentionally released her recommendation more than a week before the public hearing “so families, the community would be able to view it, understand it so when they came to the public hearing they would be prepared to share their concerns,” she said.

Hill says it’s not a good idea to delay the vote beyond June 6 because of families that will be able to consider legacy enrollment.

“This work started in the fall,” Hill said “At some point you have to get to the point where you have to make a recommendation.”