Wv Struggles To Squeeze In Students

West Valley School District’s maintenance staff was busy Wednesday converting a custodian’s room into a teachers’ lounge.

It’s one of the last dominoes to fall into place for the district as it struggles to find room for almost 100 new students.

The bulk of the increase is due to a small graduating class and a huge first grade. Only 165 students left the district this year, and 220 kindergarteners will advance to first grade in the fall, necessitating two new first-grade classrooms.

Last year, the district had 3,378 full-time students. This year, that number is expected to leap to 3,473, said Doug Matson, assistant superintendent.

The failure of five bond issues which would have built new classrooms forced the district to scrounge up more space for those students.

So the shuffling began.

The district’s other elementary schools didn’t have enough room, so space in the Millwood Early Childhood Center, which houses pre-school, kindergarten and the district’s gifted student program, was converted into first-grade classrooms.

A pre-school room, the gifted program and an office will become first-grade classrooms. The pre-schoolers will move to a teacher’s lounge. The gifted students will move to Seth Woodard Elementary and the teachers will move to the custodian’s lounge.

And the custodian? Well, that’s kind of where the trail ends.

The custodian will be crammed into a closet just big enough for a table and a chair.

Two kindergarten teachers will become first grade teachers in the fall. The district plans to fill the kindergarton positions from within the district.

But when the shuffling ends, the district will need two new teachers somewhere, Matson said.

West Valley is the only Valley school district expecting a boost in enrollment this fall. Others are holding steady or dropping.

Central Valley expects to stay close to last year’s figure of about 10,100 full-time students, said district spokesman Skip Bonuccelli.

At East Valley, Superintendent Chuck Stocker said he expects about fewer 75 fulltime students.

And at Freeman School District, south of the Valley, Superintendent Harry Amend expects enrollment to stay at 874 full-time students.

, DataTimes