Schools In East Sullivan Target Of Proposal

BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn. – Two east Sullivan County schools are on the chopping block in a proposal being considered by the Sullivan County Board of Education that could save the system almost $1 million next year.

Closing Akard Elementary School and Valley Pike Elementary School would be the first step in a multi-year effort to address problems at the county’s 28 schools, Director of Schools Jack Barnes said Wednesday.

He said the plan would free up money to either renovate and expand many county schools, some of which date to the 1920s, or build new ones. The plan also would help the county address crowding problems at some schools and under-utilization of space at others, Barnes said.

“This is by no means an answer to every problem that we have,” Barnes said. “But we need to start somewhere and this is where we are starting.”

The plan, which Barnes said was still in its rough draft, also calls for sending middle school students at Piney Flats’ Mary Hughes School to other schools and making similar changes to schools in the county’s western half.

Barnes said the proposal was drafted solely by the school system’s central office staff, though he ran it by principals at the affected schools. He said it would be up to the school board to decide what action to take.

“It’s our turn now,” Board Chairman Ron Smith said after Barnes’ presentation.

Smith said board members will discuss the plan further at a Jan. 29 workshop and then vote on which direction to take at their Feb. 2 or March 2 meeting.

School officials have been talking about some of the changes contained in the reorganization plan for many years, Barnes said. But things took a major turn in July 2007 when the Sullivan County Commission hired the Partnership for Education Facilities Assessment to look at its schools.

Partnership staff delivered two reports to members of the county commission and board of education. The first, in April 2008, studied enrollment patterns at the county’s schools and their projected capacity levels. According to the study, four schools in the county’s east school zone – an area that covers the county’s east corner, Bluff City and Piney Flats – will be overcrowded, or at 90 percent or more of capacity over the next 10 years.

Valley Pike Elementary, which is off U.S. 421 and serves an area between the Bristol Caverns Highway and the state line, was one of those four. The school also is one of four that flunked the partnership’s second report, which came out in November 2008 and looked at the physical conditions at each of the county’s 28 school buildings.

Holston Valley Middle School, Kingsley Elementary School and Weaver Elementary School also got an “F” on the November report. Holston Valley and Weaver are in the east school zone, while Kingsley is just north of Kingsport and in the county’s north school zone.

“We’ve got our hands full,” said Jerry Greene, a board of education member who represents the east school zone.

It would make sense to build a new school in the east school zone to address these problems, Greene said, but “we would need a lot more information to make those decisions.”

Valley Pike Elementary

Barnes’ plans for Valley Pike involve closing the school and sending its 149 students to Emmett Elementary. Emmett, which is off Hickory Tree Road, is one of the county’s newest schools. The school has space for 305 students, Barnes said, and could easily accommodate Valley Pike’s students if the county sent fifth-graders from both schools to Holston Valley Middle School.

Barnes estimated the Emmett-Valley Pike plan would save the county $157,402 next year in terms of reduced maintenance, nutrition and personnel costs.

The switch would cost the county one principal’s position, he said, but school officials hope to handle this loss by reassigning current staff and not filling positions left vacant by employees who retire or decide not to come back.

The remaining faculty and staff at Valley Pike would follow their students to Emmett or Holston Valley, Barnes said.

Akard Elementary School

Barnes laid out a similar scenario for Akard Elementary School, which is in the county’s central zone.

Closing Akard and sending its 134 students to Blountville Elementary would save the county another $218,775, Barnes said. Unlike Valley Pike, Akard does not have problems with its student capacity or its condition.

But the school, which serves an area between Interstate 81, Bethel Drive and the Bristol city limits, is inside Bristol’s urban growth boundary and could be annexed by the city if Bristol’s leaders so chose.

Barnes said Akard and Blountville Elementary’s fifth-graders would take their classes at Blountville Middle School, much in the same way Valley Pike and Emmett’s students would go to Holston Valley Middle School.

Mary Hughes School

The final change in Barnes’ plan for a school in the county’s east half involves the county’s Mary Hughes School, which is in Piney Flats and serves students from kindergarten to the eighth-grade.

With 483 students, Mary Hughes is already at 78 percent of its functional capacity according to the April report. With Piney Flats’ recent boom of residential growth, school officials fear that number could get even higher over the next few years and the school might end up bursting at the seams.

Barnes’ plan would send half of Mary Hughes’ 150 middle school students to Bluff City Middle School and the other half to Holston Middle School. The dividing line for the switch, he said, would be U.S. 11E.

He said the switch would save the county an estimated $139,677, and eliminate the need for modular units at Mary Hughes. Getting rid of modular units, Barnes said, has been a long-standing priority for the school board.

The Mary Hughes students who went to Holston would go back to Sullivan East High School, Barnes said, and school administrators will continue looking at the possibility of building a new school in Piney Flats to handle future growth.

Building takes time

But any plans to build a new school or launch a series of renovation and expansion projects at current ones, Barnes said, would be a long time in coming. It takes three to four years at least to build a new school once the decision has been made to go forward with the plan, he said.

The decision to build a new school or launch a major renovation project would also require a significant amount of feedback from the public and a plan to finance the new construction or repairs.

Even Barnes’ proposed changes were still up in the air, he said, and would not move forward without the board’s consent.

“We need to know what direction you want us to head in,” Barnes said. “If the board does not want this to happen, then it won’t happen.”

gmclean@bristolnews.com | (276) 645-2518

Director of Schools Jack Barnes presented a school reorganization plan to the Sullivan County Board of Education on Wednesday. Highlights of that plan, and the estimated savings, include:

EAST SCHOOL ZONE

Covers schools to the south and east of Bristol; savings: $297,000
* Close Valley Pike Elementary School and send k-4 students to Emmett Elementary School. Send fifth-graders from both to Holston Valley Middle School.
* Send Mary Hughes Elementary and Middle School’s students in grades 6-8 to Holston Middle School or Bluff City Elementary School.

CENTRAL SCHOOL ZONE

Covers schools between Bristol and Kingsport; savings: $218,775
* Close Akard Elementary School and send k-4 students to Blountville Elementary School. Send the fifth-graders from both to Blountville Middle School.

NORTH SCHOOL ZONE

Covers schools to the north of Kingsport; savings: $455,638
* Close Cedar Grove Elementary School and send students to Brookside or Kingsley Elementary School.
* Make Brookside and Kingsley only for pre-k to third-grade students and send their fourth- and fifth-graders to Ketron Intermediate.
* Send Ketron’s seventh-graders to North High School, where they will merge with North’s eighth-grade class in a segregated school environment.

SOUTH SCHOOL ZONE

Covers schools to the south of Kingsport; savings $0
* Send 130 students from Colonial Heights Middle School to Sullivan Middle School. The move will not save money, but will better prepare the school for possible Kingsport annexations.