Fair Park High School - Just a Memory?

This information is from the Shreveport Times dated September 20, 2006. If you wish to provide comments on the school consolidation issue this document provides the information on the forums for doing that, or where to provide written comments.
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Meetings focus on Caddo school reorganization

By Melody Brumble
mbrumble@gannett.com

Caddo Parish school officials will pitch a campus consolidation plan to parents and community leaders in a series of town hall meetings that kicks off Tuesday.

The proposal would combine Fair Park and Booker T. Washington high schools to combat shrinking enrollment at Booker T. Washington. Fair Park would become a kindergarten through eighth-grade campus for students attending elementary and middle schools in Shreveport's Queensborough neighborhood.

Superintendent Ollie Tyler also has suggested combining three elementary campuses and a middle school into a K-8 school in the Martin Luther King Jr. section of north Shreveport. One of the elementary campuses might become a prekindergarten center for classes previously housed at the three elementary schools.

Other schools vacated by the proposed consolidations could be reopened as centers to help overaged elementary and middle school students catch up with their peers.

School Board members will vote on a final plan before the end of the year. Consolidations could occur in the 2007-08 school years.

A longer-range plan involves Tyler and her staff tracking enrollment and population shifts over the next five years. Tyler said population changes could require construction of new schools in the Martin Luther King Jr. area and south Shreveport in the next five years.

She said Tuesday that she plans to call a community focus group together again after the town hall meetings to create a final proposal for the School Board.

Focus group member Scott Hughes said he'd like a chance to weigh community comments. He believes the 16-person committee, composed of members selected by School Board members and the district administration, thoroughly discussed the proposals but didn't reach a consensus on everything.

"The high school issue, I think that's the one that could be the most controversial," Hughes said.

If you go:
Sept. 26: Huntington High School, Shreveport.
Oct. 10: Captain Shreve High School, Shreveport.
Oct. 24: Praise Temple Full Gospel Baptist Church, Shreveport.
Oct. 26: Lake Bethlehem Baptist Church.

All meetings are from 6-7:30 p.m. Parents and community members can voice opinions or provide them in writing.

People also may send written information to:
Superintendent Ollie Tyler
Caddo Parish School Board
1961 Midway St.
Shreveport LA 71109.