On May 28, the Ad Hoc Redistricting Committee met for the first time to plan its course of action on designating which students will attend Bear Hill Elementary School. The school board created this committee to redraw school attendance boundaries in light of the new school’s opening in August 2027. There is no specific zone or school being targeted for redistricting and all elementary schools are being considered.
The meeting established the committee’s goals and a timeline for the redistricting. TESD’s last redistricting planning process occurred in 2017, with Devon Elementary School students being sent to Beaumont or Hillside Elementary School to balance the student distribution. The committee plans on following a timeline and overall approach that is similar to the previous redistricting process. Dr. Wendy Towle, director of curriculum, instruction, staff development and planning, is one of the two administrative liaisons on the committee.
“We (TESD) have redistricted previously in 2017, and during that redistricting, there was a committee of parents that worked with a board member and an external consultant to do the actual work,” Towle said.
According to Towle, main reasons for adding Bear Hill as a sixth elementary school include the new implementation of a full-day kindergarten in the district and the need to accommodate a bigger demographic of students who have a wider variety of needs.
“The enrollment numbers of kids who are currently in the attendance area for Valley Forge Elementary is much higher than Devon Elementary,” Towle said. “And you want kids at elementary school to have similar experiences no matter which school they go to.”
Dr. Roberta Hotinski, chair of the Finance Committee and a member of the Ad Hoc Public Information Committees, also chairs the redistricting committee. She stated that it will select members, create a work plan and establish a timeline for the district steering committee. The steering committee, composed of board members, administrators, parents and consultants as needed, will carry out most of the redistricting work. The district will also use bus routing software to optimize transportation routes and other district-owned technologies to gather population information across the district.
Based on the proposed redistricting timeline, the final plan will be presented and voted on by the board around late 2026 to early 2027, and the implementation of transition activities will begin shortly afterwards. Hotinski believes that although the transition may be tough at first, the redistricting committee will do its best to make it as smooth as possible.
“It will be challenging, but I know that the committee members we had the last time really worked to try to create the best plan possible that they thought would be best for the community,” Hotinski said. “We’re gonna go through a thoughtful process and hopefully come up with a good plan for the community.”
Vaishnavi Sriadibhatla can be reached at [email protected].
Nishta Subramanian can be reached at [email protected].
