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Parents, PUSD superintendent clash over no space at school

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By Emily Sorensen

Roughly a dozen angry parents of kindergartners denied entry to Willow Grove Elementary School spoke up at the Monday, Aug. 19 school board meeting, with Superintendent John Collins firing back.

The parents were led by former Poway Unified School District teacher Jennifer Duncan, who is also the parent of a kindergartner denied entry to Willow Grove, despite paying Community Facilities District taxes that went toward Willow Grove.

Roughly 60 families from the neighborhoods in Santaluz around Willow Grove discovered in May that their children would not be able to enter Willow Grove Elementary School’s kindergarten due to overcrowding, and instead would have to attend Adobe Bluffs, an older elementary school roughly five miles away.

Since then, according to Duncan, the district has done nothing to accommodate these displaced students, including refusing to put portable classrooms on the premises of Willow Grove for the students. She also said that the district declined to provide free transportation for the students being sent to Adobe Bluffs, which starts an hour earlier than Willow Grove and requires driving, unlike Willow Grove, which is within walking distance for many of the displaced families.

Duncan said she and other parents even called the company that rents relocatable classrooms to the district, and were given a quote of $27,000 for two units for the year. “But you say you can’t afford it?” said Duncan during her 10-minute speech, during the public comments section of the board meeting.

Collins disputed this, saying that it would take “six months and way more than $27,000” to put in portable classrooms for the kindergartners at Willow Grove, due to needed wiring for electricity, Internet and more. “It’s not about money, it’s about time,” said Collins.

Duncan also said that the district used a first-come, first-serve basis to enter students into Willow Grove’s kindergarten, and also broke rules for enrolling students in transitional kindergarten by allowing students born earlier than the September-to-November restriction, as well as allowing in students whose older siblings had already moved on to middle school over those without alumni siblings. “I’m paying into Willow Grove [through Mello Roos], my child should be allowed to go to Willow Grove, and not segregated out of the school because she’s the oldest in her family,” said Duncan.

Duncan wasn’t alone in referencing the recent inewsource article on possible mishandling of CFD funds by the district (See Page A6 of this week’s newspaper for the full article and a response from the district). Duncan accused the district of shifting the displaced students to Adobe Bluffs in order to filter the Willow Grove CFD funds to be used at other schools, and for themselves, referencing an expensive cafe sign at the district office, and numerous luncheons the district held. “You’re constantly taking and now you’re taking our community too,” said Duncan.

“We want to go back to Willow Grove,” said Duncan. “You had all summer and you did nothing.”

Duncan said that Adobe Bluffs was not equitable to Willow Grove in terms of programs and education offered, and that their children deserved better from the district. “The district forgets that they work for us, rather than themselves,” said Duncan.

Another hot topic brought up by numerous parents was the lack of a middle school in the area, and the perceived inadequacy of Black Mountain Middle School, where Willow Grove students are zoned to attend. Multiple parents said that Black Mountain was inadequate, and many of their neighbors were choosing to send their middle-schoolers to private schools, rather than sending them to Black Mountain. They asked that a middle school be built in the Santaluz area, or that their children be allowed to attend Oak Valley Middle School, or the new Design 39 Campus in Del Sur, once it opens.

In response to some of her fellow parents’ comments, Duncan said that she doesn’t think the quality of education is bad at Black Mountain Middle School, or that the demographic of students is bad. “Some people made comments about demographics, but that’s not most of us,” said Duncan.

Collins responded by saying there was “a lot of misinformation tonight,” and that no matter what, the district couldn’t change the number of kindergarten seats available at Willow Grove by Wednesday, Aug. 21, when the new school year begins.

Collins also said that paying Mello Roos taxes only guarantees your student a seat at a Poway Unified School district school, and not a specific school like Willow Grove, and that this fact should have been disclosed to them by the Realtor when they purchased their home within a CFD.

Collins also said that he took exception to the insinuation that Adobe Bluffs was an inferior school. “I’m sorry that you were sold a bill of goods that said your child would attend a specific school, but that is not accurate,” said Collins.

Collins also sharply rebuked the accusation that he thought that the Willow Grove students “weren’t worth it” to put in portable classrooms, which was made referencing a quote from the inewsource article. “I take great offense at the thought that any student is not worth it,” said Collins, “and to suggest that anyone at this dais thinks so is reprehensible.”

Board president Marc Davis said he understood why the parents were angry, and they “fully had the right to vent.” Davis said that Willow Grove had a “massive baby bump” this year, and that the district couldn’t plan for that. “We hope that next year [the district] can get kids back to Willow Grove, and will have the space for them,” said Davis.

Duncan said that the district’s response was “not good enough.” “They’ve known about the problem for four years, and they’ve done nothing,” said Duncan. “It’s always, I hope I hope, yet they keep spending money. They should have said they were going to find a way, now, to return all the students to Willow Grove. If not, then they meed to provide equitable schools. Free transportation would also be good.”

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